Endowed Fund: Botanist whose career bloomed at UCR gives back with an endowed gift
The Charlotte Bringle Clarke Student Success Endowed Fund will support students with a financial need who are studying natural or life sciences at UC Riverside.
Charlotte Bringle Clarke typically rises early. She'll feed her dogs, tend to her chickens, and, if the mood strikes, work on a historical guide she's writing. Later in the day she'll take a hike on the trails around Frisco, Colorado—her home for the last 27 years.
It's a life that must have seemed almost unimaginable to Clarke as a child growing up in Garden Grove, California, where she endured years of abuse from her father and stepmother, who frequently told her she wouldn't amount to anything.
By channeling her anger into hard work, Clarke took control of her life, graduating as valedictorian of her high school class, thriving in college, and building not one but two successful careers that have enabled her to live comfortably and independently.
An important part of that journey was the two years she spent as an undergraduate at UC Riverside, where she honed her passion for biology and was welcomed into the scientific community.
Clarke, who is 79, is giving back to UCR through a $139,000 planned gift to the College of Natural & Agricultural Sciences. The Charlotte Bringle Clarke Student Success Endowed Fund will support undergraduate or graduate students with a financial need who are studying natural or life sciences.
Kathryn Uhrich, dean of the College of Natural & Agricultural Sciences, said the college is proud to have Charlotte as a UCR alumna.
"Driven by her own experience as a UCR undergraduate and her contributions to the natural and life sciences, the Charlotte Bringle Clarke Student Success Endowed Fund ensures that students are supported in perpetuity by an alumna who wants them to succeed," Uhrich said. "Charlotte's endowment will guarantee that students who are experiencing financial difficulties will excel in the life and natural sciences."
Clarke knows firsthand what it's like to be self-supported in college. After graduating high school in 1960 she worked as a stenographer for four years until she'd saved enough money to attend Chaffey College in Rancho Cucamonga. While there, she worked part-time in the snack bar and library, often staying up until 3 a.m. to study for exams and maintain her self-imposed high academic standards. From there, she transferred to UCR, drawn by a scholarship and the school's reputation in the sciences. She took courses in entomology, zoology, and anatomy before settling on a major in botany.
Teachers had always been the role models in Clarke's life, and that didn't change at UCR. Clarke got a job as an undergraduate researcher with Professor Frank Vasek, where she watered plants in the greenhouses and helped Oscar Clarke (no relation), a self-taught botanist, set up the university's new herbarium. It was there that she tasted her first edible native plant—the seedpod of a wild radish. As a keen backpacker, Clarke was immediately drawn to the idea of using native plants for survival.
Through her work in Vasek's lab, Clarke was included on field trips to Mexico and Central America, where she collected many plants for the herbarium and Vasek's research. One of those trips, which involved collecting avocado seeds and skins, came with the delicious side job of eating a lot of guacamole. These opportunities, she said, would define her life and career.
After graduating from UCR in 1968, Clarke earned a master's degree at UCLA and began her teaching career at Golden West College in Huntington Beach. She taught night classes there until she secured a full-time position on the faculty at Fullerton College.
Over the course of her 25-year career, Clarke taught courses in biology, botany, and wilderness survival. She wrote a book, Edible and Useful Plants of California, which still produces royalties 44 years later, as well as dozens of articles in magazines, newspapers, and books. Over the years she received media attention and Hollywood notoriety for her expertise on edible plants, including being the subject of a Disney documentary titled "The Weed Lady of Orange County."
In 1994, Clarke bought her Frisco home with a view to retiring there later. However, after recuperating from an illness in the crisp mountain air she decided to stay on permanently. The decision meant ending her teaching career early, but allowed her to embark on a second career as a real estate agent.
"I never intended to give up teaching, but I found a way to continue helping young people by specializing in first-time buyers in a high-end market," Clarke said.
Her planned gift to UCR will make a lasting impact on the lives of young people who may otherwise struggle to pursue their dreams of a college education.
"I was so appreciative of the scholarships I received at UCR," Clarke said. "Many of today's students come out of college with a student debt akin to a mortgage so I wanted to try to ease the burden of that."
