Megan Gamble named FLC 'Volunteer of the Year'

FALLBROOK – When Megan Gamble was named the Fallbrook Land Conservancy’s (FLC) 'Volunteer of the Year' for 2015, no one was more delighted, and surprised, than she.

"It meant more to me than I thought it would," said Gamble, a founding member of the FLC who served 20 consecutive years on its board of directors. Perhaps best known as the colorful emcee of Stagecoach Sunday, the organization’s annual benefit since 1990, Gamble has also volunteered over the years as its membership chair and helped oversee many of the group’s other fundraisers.

Mike Peters, the FLC’s executive director/preserve manager, presented Gamble with a trophy at the organization’s annual holiday party in December. Since 2001, the award has been given annually to an exceptional volunteer – or volunteers – for the FLC, whose mission is "to preserve the rural character and natural beauty of our community." The FLC now owns and manages more than 3,084 acres of permanently protected open space in the Fallbrook and Bonsall areas, including 11 nature preserves.

In 2012, both Gamble and her husband, Wicker, were also awarded certificates of appreciation from the County of San Diego for their service for more than two decades as FLC volunteers and founding members.

"I don’t think I would have enjoyed the experience as much if Wicker and I hadn’t been in this together," said Gamble who, at 72, has no plans to retire anytime soon from the FLC. She attributes her passion for the group to her "involvement with its very creation – beginning in 1988."

"We were all tennis players and that’s how we knew each other," recalled Gamble. She described the group’s founding members as a "diverse group of people," she said. "But we liked being together, liked doing it, and we just had fun. I know firsthand what and who it has taken to get it started and keep it going all these years. The personal friendships formed in the process have been so wonderful – so much fun."

Gamble is a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley (B.A. in English), where she also met her husband. "I was a freshman when he was a senior, so I had met him but I didn’t know him," she explained.

Following her graduation in 1965, they crossed paths again and their friendship grew. The couple eventually married in 1968 and became the parents of a daughter, Ramsay, then a son, Peter. In 1971, the Gambles were also among the first families to join the Peace Corps. "We had two little kids and went to Ghana, West Africa for two-and-a-half years. It was an experience that changed our lives," Gamble said.

Upon returning to the states and the East Coast, she earned a master’s in education at Northeastern University in Boston and began a career in adolescent counseling. Through her husband’s career as a corporate financial analyst they moved to Melbourne, Australia in 1977, returned to the states in 1978, and came to Fallbrook in 1979.

"We were tired of the cold and wanted to be closer to family," said Gamble, who is a California native from Redondo Beach. "Wicker had been coming to Fallbrook since he was a kid with his parents – and his parents lived here."

When her husband opted out of the corporate world to start his own business, his father found a 25-acre parcel off Sandia Creek. "We bought it and began the transformation to self-employment and farming avocados along with raising our kids here," Gamble said.

"It’s fun to think of our two kids as third-generation Fallbrookians, in a sense," she added. The Gambles also have five grandchildren, ages 12 to 18.

In 1990, Gamble completed her doctorate in clinical psychology while employed as a counselor at Valley High Alternative School in Escondido from 1979 to 1996, then San Pasqual High School from 1996 to 2000. From 2000 to 2002, she transferred to the Fallbrook Union High School district as a conflict mediation specialist for students. In 2003, she returned to Escondido as a consultant and retired in 2005.

A member of the board of directors of the Fallbrook Child Development Center since January 2005, Gamble has also volunteered for the Adult Literacy Program at Fallbrook Library for six years.

She continues to play tennis and is an avid golfer, serving as president of the Fallbrook Women Golfers for two years in 2014 and 2015.

Looking back on her life in Fallbrook, Gamble said, "I remember this quote from somewhere regarding personal power in affecting change in the world. You cannot change the world. But what you can do is grow your own little garden and make it the best you can. And people may pass by and see that garden and want to do something like it themselves."

Her 28 years at the FLC, "means just that to me – cultivating our own little garden here in our town," Gamble said. "I hope that others who want to be empowered to make a little change in the world will find it to be the organization and place where they can do that – and be as personally enriched by the experience as I have been," she said. "What a win-win."

To learn more about the FLC, visit  HYPERLINK "http://www.fallbrooklandconservancy.org" www.fallbrooklandconservancy.org.