Squaw Run Garden club changes name to Trillium Garden Club

In the wake of local and national controversy over the word squaw and its meaning, a Fox Chapel area garden club has changed its name.

Squaw Run Garden Club is now Trillium Garden Club – a nod to the prolific white flowers that line local trails each spring.

“While the club has decades of history as the Squaw Run Garden Club, current members raised concerns about the word squaw as part of the group’s identity,” member Charlotte George said. “Grappling with this question was a process for club members but ultimately we came to the realization that the name of the club was not as important as its mission.”

The club was originally named to honor the Squaw Run stream that winds through the Lower Valley. But in recent years, some people have voiced concerns that the word is a derogatory term to Native American women. There is a national trend to remove the word from place names.

Squaw Peak in Arizona was renamed in 2003, and people in the Utah town of Provo pushed to rename a similarly named mountain in 2017. In August 2020, leaders at the Squaw Valley Ski Resort in California committed to a name change.

Discussions by the local garden club members paralleled those underway in O’Hara and Fox Chapel regarding the names of local parks, roads and a stream.

In August 2020, O’Hara council voted to change the name of its most popular park from Squaw Valley Park to O’Hara Township Community Park.

Fox Chapel council followed this year in March by renaming one of the borough’s most heavily traveled roads, Squaw Run, to Hemlock Hollow Road.

Squaw Run Road East was renamed Riding Meadow Road.

Miguel Sague, a board member with the Council of Three Rivers American Indian Center (COTRAIC), applauded the garden club’s move and said it aligns with a larger transformation in the region.

“We completely support the local residents who have done so much to change this awful word,” he said.

Sague is part of a small committee of historians, elected officials and Native Americans who crafted educational displays to be erected in O’Hara. He said the signs will help educate people on the history of the area.

Garden club members said they chose Trillium for the new name because it honors the Native American appreciation of nature. It is also fitting since the club uses a painting of trillium on its correspondence, George said.

Founded in the late 1940s, the garden club works to support local groups through education and fundraising.

Members are known for their plant sale hosted each May in O’Hara Township Community Park. For two days, crowds browse through perennials, herbs and vegetables.

Shoppers can purchase colorful peonies, hanging baskets, bunches of lavender and other items to perk up their landscapes or tables.

Proceeds benefit local projects that in recent years have included a garden at O’Hara Elementary School.

Last month, members donated money to Camp Guyasuta for the purchase of a brush cutter.

Over the past 10 years, the club has donated more than $15,000 to Aspinwall Riverfront Park, Cooper-Siegel Community Library and Best of Blawnox.

The club also provides yearly grants to The Audubon Society of Western Pennsylvania, Fox Chapel Land Trust, Pittsburgh Botanic Gardens, Western Pennsylvania Conservatory and Phipps Conservatory.