[1] Ellen Quillin taught in the San Antonio public school system from 1916 to 1933; from 1923 to 1933 she was director of nature study and science.
[1] In the 1920s, Quillin was instrumental in organizing the San Antonio Museum Association and raising funds to house the collection of natural history specimens of Henry Philemon Attwater.
As a fundraising initiative in response, Quillin built the Reptile Garden on museum grounds, using donated labor and materials.
[1] Despite the gimmicky snake-handling demonstrations and turtle races, the Reptile Garden became a research facility for antivenom experimentation and it attracted international scholars.
On closure of the Reptile Garden, the collection of live snakes was donated to the San Antonio Zoo.
[1][4] Ellen Quillin published several scholarly books, articles, and popular works on local botany.
[1][6] On the occasion of her retirement from the Witte, the city of San Antonio designated October 30, 1960 as "Ellen Quillin Day."
[1][7] The life and work of Ellen Quillin, including the founding of the Witte, were dramatized in 1999 by the play, A Gallery of Ghosts, by Laura Dietrich.