Alan Slack – An Amazingly Generous Gift

We celebrate Alan Slack, for his leadership gift of $250,000 to Tyler Arboretum! A former Tyler board member, Alan chose to give through his estate. He designated his full gift for Tyler’s general endowment to care for our precious 650 acres and support our community outreach.

This presents a wonderful opportunity to strengthen Tyler’s financial sustainability and operational capacity, one of our most important priorities now and into the future. We thank Alan for understanding that and for his foresight in arranging his gift so many years ago.

For those who didn’t know Alan, he was a man of many interests and talents. His passion and masterful knowledge of horticulture prompted his service on several boards, at Tyler, Jenkins, and Scott Arboreta. He also served several board terms with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society and the Brandywine Conservancy and Museum of Art.

He was an accomplished organist and painter. He learned the intricacies of the pipe organ as a young man. After years of playing professionally for churches, his pipe organ held a prominent position in his living room. He took up and mastered painting after retiring from a 32-year engineering role with Boeing.

He served on the Tyler Board of Trustees for many years. One of his proudest accomplishments was chairing the Search Committee that hired Rick Colbert as Tyler’s Executive Director in 1991. They were kindred spirits in horticulture. In more recent years, he supported Tyler’s horticulture endeavors and our efforts to encourage donors to include Tyler in their estate plans.

We are most grateful for his thoughtful and kind-hearted gift to Tyler. Please join us in celebrating Alan’s tremendous generosity!