Tina Marie Wilcox

Tina Marie Wilcox has been the head gardener and herbalist at the Ozark Folk Center's Heritage Herb Garden in Mountain View, Arkansas, since 1984. Over four decades she has tended those extensive gardens, developed annual herbal events and workshops, and overseen the production and sale of plants, seeds, and herbal products for the park, all while carrying the living knowledge of Ozark herb traditions into classrooms, kitchens, and demonstration spaces across the country. She is co-author, with Susan Belsinger, of The Creative Herbal Home and Not Just Desserts: Sweet Herbal Recipes, and her work sits at the intersection of horticultural history, foodways, and everyday folk practice. At the Arkansas Folklife Festival, Wilcox brings that same hands-on approach: herbs not as artifacts, but as living culture still in use.