Drive Pellissippi Parkway to Hardin Valley Road and take a minute to enjoy the daffodils. They are the gift of one woman. Maria de la Luz Compere died in January 2013 at age 97. Her legacy includes those swatches of white and yellow that pop up every year to announce spring.
Maria Compere
Maria and her husband, Edgar, founded Knoxville Green, which purchased and sold bulbs at the Unitarian Church parking lot. There’s no known total of the plants the Comperes distributed in Knoxville and Oak Ridge, where he worked as a nuclear scientist at ORNL.
But the Pellissippi Beautification Committee alone planted nearly two million daffodil bulbs along Pellissippi Parkway.
With age, Maria slowed a bit, but she was quick to recruit family and friends to carry on her projects.
According to her obituary, Mrs. Compere came to the United States from Mexico to study biochemistry at Louisiana State University. She and Edgar raised three daughters who blessed them with five granddaughters.
I hope each of them drives Pellissippi Parkway to view their mother’s work. Her vision and determination should motivate us all.