[2][3] She was a farmer's daughter and was intrigued as a young child by the freshly turned soil on her father's land.
In the 1960s, while concerned about the number of dead birds around her property in Milwaukee, she brought hearings on the pesticide use in Wisconsin.
[5] In 1979, after hearing Otto lecture, Ginny Lindow and eight other women began to meet monthly to discuss natural landscaping.
[4] "More than anyone else, Lorrie Otto brought the whole idea of natural landscaping to the public's view," says naturalist Craig Tufts, manager of NWF's Backyard Wildlife Habitat Program.
She was buried at the Greenacres Memorial Park's The Meadow, a "green" cemetery in Ferndale where only biodegradable materials are used and embalming is not allowed.