Remembering Wheatland’s ‘Tulip Lady’ – A Special to The Appeal Democrat
You might have known her for her tulips, spunky jokes, or place at the bingo table, but until now, only a few knew about the courageous life she lived.
Pearl was born on June 15, 1928, in Warren, Ohio. It was a beautiful day, sunny and 70, which might explain her green thumb. At 18, she relocated to California with her parents.
Before she knew it, Pearl was married and a mother of two boys, Randall and Ronald. She and her husband Ike purchased a small piece of land on 4th Street in Wheatland and began to build their family home.
The finishing touch on this house wasn’t paint or the décor inside it. No, what made this house Pearl’s was the tulips she planted in front of it.
She could almost always be caught among her tulips, watering and tending to them. She cared for them so entirely that she never allowed them to wither, and each year she would dig out the bulbs and replant them in the spring. This was how her title was donned as the town’s beloved Tulip Lady.
Her gardening didn’t stop there, in fact it expanded season after season. She grew bulbs, tomatoes, vegetables, and other hand-picked varieties. Soon enough, she was harvesting a bounty big enough to cook dinner with.
When she wasn’t building a house, being a wife and mother, or gardening, she was a true-blue fisherman. Pearl loved to take her boys on fishing adventures as often as she could. It was a season of life she cherished and spoke of regularly.
Pearl also had a job bartending at the local Sheridan Bar, where she quickly won the town over. It’s suspected that this was where she acquired her knack for witty jokes that she never could stop telling. Up until her last day, she could make a room blush.
Pearl made a career out of waitressing locally and was a favorite of many at Pizza Hut, Red Hill, Bill’s Place, and Presley’s Café in Wheatland. Her customers loved and adored her.
Only 11 years after she and Ike had built their home together, he passed away. But Pearl kept watering her tulips.
Years came and passed, and so did her son Randall, but again, she kept on watering her tulips.
When the day came that she could no longer walk, she wheeled herself out to her garden in her wheelchair, and still, she watered those tulips.
These tulips were her superpower in life. Her saving grace and small slice of happiness that forever returned to her, season after season.
Two years ago in mid-winter, the roof of Pearl’s house had been removed. Ice cold, covered with wet blankets and sopping socks, the Tulip Lady survived eight days of water-logging.
As a Wheatland realtor drove past the rain-flooded house, she reasoned that there was no way the Tulip Lady was still inside, right?
On Dec. 14, 2021, that realtor called two other realtors and one of them decided to do a wellness check, just in case. To her horror, she found a half-frozen Pearl, begging for help.
The three women banded together to save the Tulip Lady. They immediately removed her from the house and took her to a warm hotel room. The entire town donated funds to keep the Tulip Lady there for three weeks until the rescue trio could move Pearl into a permanent home in Wheatland, at the Donner Trail Senior Apartments.
Who were these three incredible ladies?
They took Pearl in as if she were an immediate family member. They fought for her to have the absolute best caregivers possible, conducting interviews, recruiting top candidates, and constantly monitoring Pearl’s wellbeing.
Not only did she have the best care out there, but she also had a beautiful home filled with donated furniture and decorations to make her as comfortable and warm as possible.
Once the Tulip Lady’s normal temperature returned to her, so did her garden. This time, her tulip beds were custom-made for her wheelchair height. She could once again water her tulips.
And she did.
She also grew and shared tomatoes, had countless parties and meals with her favorite ladies, visited with family members, took trips to the casino, played lots of crazy dice, and dominated Friday bingo – so much so, that the team would come to hunt her down if she overslept, so that she never missed a game.
Pearl was many things to many people – a daughter, sister, wife, mother, grandmother, friend, waitress, jokester, teammate, gardener, fisherman, gambler, the Tulip Lady. But more than anything, she was a courageous fighter who was always able to find the beauty in life.
She will be dearly missed by many and forgotten by none.
