Toby Hemenway
Toby Hemenway | |
|---|---|
| Born | April 23, 1952 |
| Died | December 20, 2016 (aged 64) |
| Occupation | Writer, educator, environmentalist |
| Language | English |
| Alma mater | Tufts University |
| Genre | Non-fiction |
| Subject | Permaculture, peak oil, sustainability |
| Notable works | Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture |
| Spouse | Kiel Hemenway |
| Website | |
| tobyhemenway | |
Toby Hemenway (April 23, 1952 – December 20, 2016)[1] was an American author and educator who wrote extensively on permaculture and ecological issues. He was the author of Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture and The Permaculture City: Regenerative Design for Urban, Suburban, and Town Resilience. He served as an adjunct professor at Portland State University, Scholar-in-Residence at Pacific University, and field director at the Permaculture Institute (USA).[2]
Career
After obtaining a degree in biology from Tufts University, Hemenway worked for many years as a researcher in genetics and immunology, first in academic laboratories including Harvard and the University of Washington in Seattle.[3] He also worked at Immunex, a major medical biotech company.[1]
At about the time he was growing dissatisfied with the direction biotechnology was taking, he discovered permaculture. A career change followed, and Hemenway and his wife, Kiel, spent ten years creating a rural permaculture site in southern Oregon. He was the editor of Permaculture Activist, a journal of ecological design and sustainable culture, from 1999 to 2004.[3] He moved to Portland, Oregon in 2004, and after six years of developing urban sustainability resources there, Hemenway and his wife divided their time between Sebastopol, California and western Montana.
Hemenway died of pancreatic cancer on December 20, 2016.[2][4]
The Permaculture Skills Center in California opened a Toby Hemenway Memorial Library using the author’s personal collection.[5]
Selected works
Books
- Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture (2001, ISBN 978-1890132521) [6]
- The Permaculture City: Regenerative Design for Urban, Suburban, and Town Resilience (2015, ISBN 978-1603585262) [7]
Other
- Foreword to Jono Neiger's The Permaculture Promise (2006) [8][9]
- Foreword to Heather C. Flores’ Food Not Lawns (2006) [10]
Lectures
- How Permaculture can Save Humanity and the Planet - but not Civilization
- Redesigning Civilization with Permaculture
References
- ^ a b Mason, Clark (22 December 2016). "Toby Hemenway, leading permaculture promoter, dies at 64". Santa Rosa Press Democrat. Retrieved 24 August 2019.
- ^ a b Bane, Peter (21 December 2016). "Author of Gaia's Garden Dies". Permaculture Design Magazine. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
- ^ a b Heinberg, Richard (21 December 2016). "Appreciating Toby Hemenway 1952-2016". Resilience. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
- ^ "Update on Toby Hemenway's Battle With Cancer". Toby Hemenway. December 19, 2016.
- ^ "Toby Hemenway, April 23, 1952 – December 20, 2016". Permaculture Skills Center. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
- ^ "Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture". Redemption Permaculture. 6 September 2024. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
- ^ The Permaculture City. Chelsea Green. 17 July 2015. ISBN 978-1-60358-527-9. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
- ^ "Toby Hemenway". Good Reads. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
- ^ The Permaculture Promise. Storey Publishing, LLC. 28 January 2023. ISBN 978-1-61212-428-5. Retrieved November 20, 2025.
{{cite book}}:|website=ignored (help) - ^ "Food Not Lawns". Open Library. Retrieved November 20, 2025.