Ann Croissant, San Gabriel Mountains environmental advocate, dies at age 81

The rare, thread-leaved brodiaea grabbed the spotlight these past 30 years, surreptitiously poking through the soil of a preserved canyon just below the San Gabriel Mountains, its spindly stem crowned by fragile purple pedals splayed toward the heavens.

But the woman responsible for this endangered plant’s miraculous rebirth — environmental activist, educator and preservationist Ann Croissant — rarely took center stage. She loved nature, and in particular, the diversity of native plants, but she ducked attention, instead instilling the joy of recreation onto others.

“She was the educational and environmental mother I always wanted to have. She hardly talked about herself. It was always about being there, for the environment and for other people,” said Angelica M. González, former Sierra Club Angeles Chapter conservation program manager, her voice cracking as the news of her mentor’s death flooded her senses.

Croissant died June 26 from complications of lung cancer. She was 81. Croissant, a botanist and earth scientist, spent most of her life in Glendora, buying hillsides for preservation and leading tours of the miracle flower. She also taught at Cal Poly Pomona (19781987), Mount San Antonio College (1984-1987) and Azusa Pacific University (1987-1997) and served as science curriculum consultant since 1978 for Los Angeles and San Bernardino County schools.

She formed the Glendora Community Conservancy in 1991, and the nonprofit bought the property containing the brodiaea in the foothills of Glendora, preventing a 30-unit housing project from being built. The discovery of Brodiaea filifolia halted the project and made history.

“She was the reason why that trail was preserved,” said her daughter, Polly Clements, on Thursday.

The blue-violet flower is so rare that it grows in only a few locations — the Colby Trail at the terminus of Lorraine Avenue, and at nearby Bluebird Ranch, a later conservancy purchase — and are the only places in Los Angeles County where the plant exists. The federallylisted threatened species is sometimes found growing in the Santa Rosa Plateau in Riverside County, and less frequently in parts of Orange and San Diego counties.

But the Glendora location sprouted more of the species than anywhere, including a superbloom of 6,900 plants in 2012 and 8,500 plants in 2017.

Hills are alive

Movements to preserve foothills bordering the Angeles National Forest took many forms. Some cities, such as Monrovia, taxed itself to to buy land for preservation. Croissant did it by forging partnerships and acquiring grants.

Her efforts led to the conservancy taking ownership of 700 hillside acres, said Jackie Wall Doornik, who served on the board of Croissant’s second conservancy, the San Gabriel Mountains Regional Conservancy. That group, led by Croissant, refurbished the nature center at the county’s Santa Fe Dam Recreation Area, where it also carved out trails among native plants and established a waterless garden.

“The whole mountainside here in Glendora would have been housing if it weren’t for Ann,” Doornik said.

Croissant also helped shape management plans for the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument, established by President Barack Obama in 2014. Doornik is the SGMRC’s representative on the ad hoc collaborative that worked with the U.S. Forest Service to create a plan for the monument.

Croissant served on the board of directors of the Claremont Hills Conservation Corporation from 2009 to 2018.

Not about awards

Croissant presented research for the Urban Land Institute and received numerous accolades, including one from the American Planning Association for her work on “Reconnecting the San Gabriel Valley: A Planning Approach for the Creation of Interconnected Urban Wildlife Corridor Networks,” in 2000. She received the Humanitarian Award from the Glendora Community Coordinating Council in 2012.

But those who worked with her said she didn’t focus on awards, but on relationships.

“She made you feel good about the Earth we live on,” Doornik said. “Ann saw the Earth and I loved seeing it through her eyes.”

Jeff Michelson, 54, whose property is near the Colby Trail and Bluebird Ranch and is a member of the Sierra Club Angeles Chapter, recalled an October 2024 project involving planting oak seeds in the canyons.

“Ann always had a way to get people involved, even if you didn’t want to. She said to me: ‘Jeff, we need some mulch and acorns.’ So I had mulch brought up to the site and she invited young students from Cal Poly Pomona to help. We planted the seeds in the ground and put mulch over it. Twelve months later, my gosh! The trees were starting to sprout,” he said.

Croissant combined what some called conservative environmentalism, her Christian faith and a grass roots, hands-on approach.

Gonzalez recalled her clashing with the Sierra Club. She was sometimes criticized for not going along with the group’s political stances. “She never liked bureaucracy. She really wanted to empower movements with grass roots,” she said.

Family, people mattered

Croissant grew up in eastern Kentucky. Her parents were teachers but owned grocery stores where a she worked when she was young. After earning a bachelor’s degree from Northern Colorado University in biology and earth science, and a master’s in botany from University of Wisconsin, she completed her Ph.D. in 1991 in curriculum and instruction/higher education and botany from USC.

She moved to Glendora with her husband, Gerald Croissant, who taught agronomy at Cal Poly Pomona. Together, with photos by Shirley DeBraal, they wrote, “Wildflowers of the San Gabriel Mountains” in 2007.

She is survived by her husband, Gerald, 84; her daughter Polly Clements, 50; her son, Brian Croissant, 56; and her daughter, Carol White, 46.

Clements, who said she is “heartbroken” by the loss of her mother, has not yet planned a memorial service, she said. Those interested in leaving their remembrances or staying in touch can email her at: clements05@verizon.net.

In the past week, she has received emails and even bumped into people who remembered going on a hike up the Colby Trail with her mom. Clements said in the last week of her life, she still was tapping on her computer trying to answer emails and connect people to a project.

“‘Everybody has a purpose, a talent,’ she would say. It was all done out of love, from her heart and from the stewardship of the land and her service to God,” Clements said.