Bad news folks. Just saw this. Here's the link.
http://www.durhamr...870p-4205989c.html In case the link didn't work:
Cullen Gardens founder dies
Len Cullen, 81, remembered as a dreamer and humanitarian
Aug 16, 2006
By David Blumenfeld
WHITBY -- He was a visionary and entrepreneur; a man who turned his dream into reality and gave the Town of Whitby worldwide popularity. But his family says Len Cullen would have called himself "just a gardener."
Mr. Cullen, who founded Cullen Gardens and Miniature Village, died Tuesday after being diagnosed earlier this year with pancreatic cancer. He was 81.
"He was very much an entrepreneur and visionary," said his eldest daughter, Sue Cullen-Green. "He was very creative. He loved to build things -- build businesses, build structures, build people up as well. He was a poet, a dreamer. He was a devoted Christian, cherished father and grandfather and beloved husband."
Mr. Cullen operated numerous businesses -- Weall and Cullen Garden Centre, Greendale Garden Products and Cullen Country Barns -- but is remembered most for Cullen Gardens and Miniature Village, which opened in Whitby in 1980 and went on to international success, drawing people from around the world before it was acquired by the Town of Whitby in January.
"I think Cullen Gardens was his really big dream, although he had to build his foundation within Weall and Cullen in order to do Cullen Gardens," Ms. Cullen-Green said. "His legacy is going to live on in numerous ways. It's going to live on in people... then he has a legacy of what he created."
Born in Toronto in 1925, Mr. Cullen's life-long association with Whitby began in 1955 when he bought a nursery farm on Hwy. 12 in Brooklin in order to grow his nursery stock. He bought the surrounding valley lands in 1966 and the following year built a log cabin on-site ( still standing today) as a summer vacation spot for his family.
"That's when the vision began, that perhaps he could have a beautiful garden with miniature houses that people from around the world could enjoy," Ms. Cullen-Green said.
When Cullen Gardens celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2005, Mr. Cullen said he was inspired by Rupert Edwards, who developed Edward Gardens in Toronto, to open a similar attraction in Whitby.
"I saw what great fun he was having making this garden, and I said to myself if I ever get an opportunity, I'm going to open a garden and invite the world to come. I never thought it would make it," he said.
Although he knew Mr. Cullen had been ill for quite some time, Whitby Mayor Marcel Brunelle said he was "deeply saddened" by news of his death. He called it a great loss not only for the Cullen family, but for the community.
"He was a great guy in terms of developing things, and giving money and help to people that was never known about," he said. "Talk about a guy who put himself out front, took the responsibility and then carried through without any obligation whatsoever. He was more than just an entrepreneur... he was a guy who really deeply believed in things and put his money where his mouth was."
Councillor Gerry Emm, who was on council when Mr. Cullen brought forward the idea of the tourist attraction in the late 1970s, said he was a man who certainly fulfilled his dreams.
"He put Whitby on the map as far as attraction and tourism -- well beyond our provincial borders. People, especially in the early years in the 80s, they came by busloads," Coun. Emm said, adding that Mr. Cullen was working toward another tourist attraction for children at the corner of Hwy. 7 and Coronation Road.
Ms. Cullen-Green said she wants people to know her father loved Whitby -- its landscape and its people.
"If you want to talk globally he loved Canada too," she said. "So if he could make Whitby important as a part of Canada, in doing this via Cullen Gardens, then he was thrilled. He felt he had accomplished what he wanted."
R.I.P. Mr. Cullen.
More to come... 
