The senior Kings lived at an estate called Wilder Park, which they had inherited from wealthy businessman Seth Wadhams, who had originally named it White Birch.

[1] Louisa's mother-in-law was a skilled gardener, having cultivated 200 varieties of herbs, flowers, plants, and fruit trees, and her library was well-stocked with books on horticulture.

[5] Louisa King quickly rose to prominence as a lecturer, author, and organizer of garden clubs.

[2] King counted among her correspondents and friends Charles Sprague Sargent of the Arnold Arboretum and landscape architects Fletcher Steele, Ellen Biddle Shipman, and Martha Brookes Hutcheson.

[7][8][9] Two years later, she was one of the cofounders and original vice-presidents of the Garden Club of America in Philadelphia (GCA), which had a substantial influence on how landscape architecture developed as a profession in subsequent decades.

King, who served as the first president of the WNF&GA from 1914 to 1921, saw horticulture and gardening as a means for women to establish themselves in the world; under her guidance, the WNF&GA established scholarships for women to pursue academic study of agriculture, botany, and landscape architecture.

[3][6][7][2][10] During World War I, the WNF&GA and GCA helped organize the Woman's Land Army of America: 15,000 so-called "farmerettes" worked in agriculture, replacing men called into military service.

[8] A supporter of the United Nations, Louisa King proposed an International Horticultural Society, writing, "Gardeners never fight with each other.

"[3] Louisa Yeomans King died on January 16, 1948, aged 84, at her daughter's home in Milton, Massachusetts;[2][11] her ashes are scattered at Kingstree in South Hartford.

[6][10] Cultivars of tulip, gladiolus, and daffodil have been named for her,[3] and the Dogwood Collection at the National Arboretum in Washington, D.C., was created in her honor.