Margaret McGrath

Margaret McGrath Rockefeller (September 28, 1915 – March 26, 1996) was a founding member of two land conservation organizations: the Maine Coast Heritage Trust in 1970 and the American Farmland Trust which was formed in 1980 as a national farmland conservation organization. Throughout her life she was a board member of many organizations and raised funds for conservation projects across the United States of America. She died in 1996 at the age of 80 in New York Hospital. Early years Margaret was born to Francis Sims and Neva van Zandt Smith McGrath on 28 September 1915. Growing up in Mt. Kisco, NY she went to school first at the Rippowam School in Bedford, NY followed by the Shipley School in Bryn Mawr, Pa., then the Chapin School in New York. In the 1930s, she met David Rockefeller whom she married in 1940 at Bedford, New York. During the 1970s, Margaret started to raise cattle on land close to Rockefeller summer home at Seal Harbor, Bartlett Island in Maine and then at the couple's home in Tarrytown, N.Y. She became a breeder of Simmental cattle, purchasing four farms in western Columbia County, N.Y. in the 1980s, including The Hermitage, a Livingston family estate which she had torn down in 1983. Interest in conservation Margaret Rockefeller was the sole founder of the Maine Coast Heritage Trust and was its chair for a number of years. The Trust has conserved around 66,000 acres and many buildings in Maine and works towards keeping wildlife habitats, establishing public access to the coast, and providing educational support. One of the trust's projects is dedicated to the memory of Margaret Rockefeller, the Stone Barn Centre, which displays a plaque commemorating her commitment to farmland preservation.