Sumter Today: Grants will help preserve famous Pearl Fryar Topiary Garden in Bishopville

Pearl Fryer is famous for his decades of creating and maintaining his large topiary garden at his home in Bishopville.
With more than 400 sculpted, trimmed and shaped shrubs, trees and plants, his work has been featured in magazines and documentaries nationwide.
Unfortunately, the 81-year-old’s health has been declining, and unable to keep up with the maintenance of his art, so has his garden.
Now, several organizations, including the McKissick Museum at USC and the Atlanta Botanical Garden, are working together to provide grants to preserve Fryar’s life work.
The $5,000 grant will help reinvigorate and create a preservation plan for the garden, a piece of work the McKissick Museum’s executive director said should be “preserved as a monument to African American resilience and creativity in shaping the American landscape.”