215 The Women Who Built Harding In 2015, Harding University celebrated its newly completed First Ladies Garden – a memorial that seeks to honor the contributions of Harding’s first ladies. The walkway rounds off into different sections, each boasting unique flora that represent one of Harding University’s first ladies. The first garden in tribute to Woodson Harding Armstrong contains forsythias, hydrangeas and crabapples all flowers popular from Woodson Armstrong’s era. Continuing the walk down the garden’s path, the next section of the garden blooms with amur maples and weeping cherries favorites of Sally Hockaday Benson, who was an avid gardener and the wife of Harding’s second president, George S. Benson. Roses and delicate lavenders adorn Louise Nicholas Ganus’ portion of the First Ladies Garden. Flowers like red double knockout roses and flowering quince abound in Leah Ann Gentry Burk’s portion of the garden, but they also abounded in the personal garden she kept in her home, which she so often opened for tours to raise money for the University. Renaissance spirea and coral bells azalea finish out the fifth semi-circle of the First Ladies Garden. This section honors Harding’s fifth first lady, Ann Hutson McLarty, wife of Bruce McLarty. The impact of this university over these past one hundred years would have been impossible were it not for the work and dedication of the women of Harding. 2010s Dedication of the newly completed First Ladies Garden Apr. 29, 2016. Photo courtesy of Jeff Montgomery As Harding begins its next one hundred years, it welcomed with it fresh ideas and faces, most notably our newest first lady Lisa Williams — or Ambassador (a term Lisa Williams said was more welcoming) — the garden has yet to add her section. However, the First Ladies’ Garden as well as the rest of the University were eager to work with her in the coming years. Lisa Williams grew up in West Virginia. She loved playing in the outdoors and often had to be told to come inside as a child. She came to Harding in the 80s, wanting to major in interior design but instead settling on elementary education. The couple met at Harding, they met through a blind date and became engaged in the winter of ’86 when Mike Williams asked her “if she would marry Santa Claus.” Lisa Williams became an elementary teacher for grades three, five and six while also creating Arkansas’ Virtual Education Academy while Mike Williams joined the staff at Harding. In 2015 Mike Williams became the President of Faulkner University and they moved from Searcy to Montgomery, Alabama. They had a prolific career at Faulkner, founding a college of health science and an autism center. In fact, a focus on autism and a better understanding of it was something Lisa Williams said she wanted to contribute to Harding’s campus. In addition, she wants to continue to create more spaces for women to contribute to the University and more opportunities for students to tell the story of their faith all to create more community. Lisa Williams has already begun these endeavors while serving on the board for the new Women of Faith initiative launched in chapel in fall 2023 to honor the many esteemed alumnae and foster opportunities for service and growth with the current student body. This advisory was in conjunction with the new Holland-Waller Center, which houses the foreign language, history and political science, international studies and international student programs, ROTC and the Swaid Institute for International Education. The Harding community was excited to usher in this new era which sought to honor the lives and works of those who came before. Lisa Williams poses for a photo for the Petit Jean. Photo from Petit Jean 2022-2023
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