Threadleaf coreopsis (Coreopsis verticillata 'Zagreb') is one of the many species of Coreopsis native to North America. It tends to be a good selection for that spot where nothing else seems to survive because it thrives in poor, sandy or rocky soils as long as there is good drainage. It is also tolerant of heat, humidity and drought. It can spread somewhat aggressively so just be careful where you put it in your garden!
“Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky.”
–Kahlil Gabran
Cover: The Kentucky coffee tree (Gymnocladus dioicus a noticeable specimen tree at Cylburn Arboretum because of the large hanging seed pods. Tolerance to pollution and a wide range of soils makes it a suitable tree for urban environments so it is particularly good for large lawns or parks.
As many of you might have read in our local newspapers, we lost a dear friend at the end of May. A direct lightning strike felled Cylburn Arboretum’s beloved dawn redwood, prompting an outpouring of love and grief from supporters. For many of us, this tree was more than just a part of the landscape. It was a gathering place for families, a haven for wildlife, and a silent witness to special moments – engagements, weddings, birthdays. The notable tree prompted awe in our visitors, and it served as a natural landmark within our arboretum.
While the loss of this magnificent tree is deeply felt, we have been heartened by the way it has continued to bring people together! As an arboretum, we plant trees for so many different reasons – to demonstrate horticultural significance, for educational display, to collect and conserve our region’s biodiversity. Our dawn redwood reminded us that we also plant for beauty. After all, what better way could there be to inspire a love of nature and of this place? In the coming seasons, we will be formulating a plan to give the space new life. In the meantime, we deeply appreciate you and the pictures you have shared, the suggestions you have made, and the support you have shown.
A strong Cylburn community is particularly important this year as we celebrate our 70th anniversary. Seven decades after the formal establishment of our Friends group, we are grateful for each person who has played a role in the Arboretum's long history and to everyone who supports our work today. As Cylburn Arboretum Friends members, you are vital to our decades of
Brooke M. Fritz, Executive Director Cylburn Arboretum Friends
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Rebecca Henry President
Hilles Whedbee Vice President
Ramesh Moorthy Secretary
Robert A. Cook Treasurer
Linda Wright Butler
Will Clemens
Beverly Davis
Emily Dillon
Patricia Foster
Alan Gilbert
Sandra P. Gohn
Mark Gurley
Nancy B. Hill
Mae Hinnant
Sorrel King
Douglas Nelson
Daniel Pham
Courtney Sawyer
Nell B. Strachan
EX OFFICIO
Melissa Grim
Chief Horticulturist, Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks
Colleen Vacelet Owner, Intreegue Design
SEASONS is published by Cylburn Arboretum Friends
Written and edited by
Brooke M. Fritz Executive Director
Erika Castillo Director of Education
Brent Figlestahler Head Gardener
CONTENTS
A DAWN REDWOOD OBITUARY PAGE 2
Bill Geenen | Communication Design Layout and Design 6
ADDING GARDEN EDUCATION TO CYLBURN NATURE CAMP PAGE 10
4915 Greenspring Ave. Baltimore, MD 21209
Info@cylburn.org
Phone: (410) 367-2217 Cylburn.org
UPCOMING EVENTS: BACK COVER 2
CELEBRATING 70 YEARS
PAGE 6
UPCOMING SPEAKER SERIES PAGE12
BY BRENT FIGLESTAHLER
A DAWN REDWOOD OBITUARY:
Cylburn Arboretum’s beloved Dawn Redwood, or Metasequoia glyptostroboides, went out with a bang on the evening of May 27, Memorial Day, 2024. The cause of untimely death was a lightning strike, which superheated the abundant moisture permeating the wood at that time of year. The Dawn Redwood exploded, hurling debris for hundreds of feet, damaging neighboring trees, and leaving little usable timber behind. Planted in 1965 by Gerard Moudry, the BCRP Chief Horticulturist, Cylburn's Dawn Redwood grew to a healthy height of nearly 80 feet and possessed an enviable girth at the root flare five feet in diameter. The tree was just three feet tall in the early 1970’s, remembers then Baltimore City Naturalist, Glenda Weber. Cylburn’s Dawn Redwood went on to faithfully serve the community as an ambassador for woody plants everywhere, representing beauty and intrigue despite its non-native status. The exploded tree is survived by its neighboring deciduous conifers (two Bald Cypresses – Taxodium distichum, a Golden Larch – Pseudolarix amabilis, and its newest neighbor a Japanese Larch – Larix kaempferi), a distraught team of horticulturists, and a shocked public with many memories and photographs of this special tree. The splintered giant was entirely and completely laid to rest on May 30, 2024, via chainsaw and dump truck. The laborers present were solemn. Memories and donations are welcome and can be directed to Cylburn Arboretum Friends.
Drawing: Daniel Pham
TREES AND US
I have never written an obit, especially not one for a tree. However, I think that’s how it might go – factual, to the point, and without much emotion. For many, especially those who care for them, trees take on an air of permanence, like a larger-than-life relative. Consequently, the remaining portion of this essay will tend more toward the emotional.
As a culture, we imbue these long-lived, stationary plants with special meaning called up from the depths of our collective need to develop shared symbols. These living monuments symbolize stability, resilience, and peace in a world of instability. Seemingly everpresent and possessing greater lifespans than ours, trees help us gauge the seasons, observe weather, and monitor changes in climate. Trees are relatable. Like us, trees are genetically predisposed to take on a certain form, yet each one is a unique product of parentage and the niche environment in which each takes root. This is to say, there was no other tree like our Dawn Redwood. Trees’ inanimate nature makes it easy for us to for us to heap meaning upon them. As far as we know, they cannot talk back. While we thought the world of our Dawn Redwood, we’ll never know what it thought of us.
decisions in our lives, we often look past the beauty and magic that has taken root and, most importantly, matured without our thorough vetting or involvement. Even in death, the spectacle of Cylburn’s Dawn Redwood is turning heads and inspiring questions. In the spirit of outreach, education, and even memorialization, here’s more about our Dawn Redwood, and Metasequoia glyptostroboides as a species.
THE PEOPLES TREE OF CYLBURN
The words of a former landscape architecture professor have echoed in my head of late. He was prone to remarking – “a tree is not a tree is not a tree.” While his sentiment had much more to do with the differing roles trees play in varied landscapes, the phrase takes on new meaning when pondering the individuality of trees, especially in the case of a lost specimen. The spectacle of this particular death provides a freedom to take an unbiased look at the merits of a tree. The lens most often applied to trees today is that of potential plant additions to landscapes or gardens. Given our proclivity for controlling
Cylburn’s Metasequoia was what I think of as an ambassador tree Through my own rosetinted glasses, all trees are uniquely spectacular. Our Dawn Redwood though, held a certain spell over the uninitiated. The lay person, the average visitor to the arboretum, and the occasional expert all found a certain awe when encountering this tree. The tree was home to many child-stalked-toads and fairy homes. Numerous weddings and engagements were celebrated in front of or beneath it. Summer campers and field trip classes alike have linked arms to measure its grand trunk and in turn measured themselves in relation to it. One could argue that this single tree did more advocacy and education surrounding the local appreciation of trees than all the Cylburn staff combined. What it is exactly that endeared this tree to so many people is hard to measure, but certain qualities and forms come to mind.
For starters, the Dawn Redwood’s form is strikingly pyramidal, like the point of a field tip arrow. This form has a direct relationship to the tree’s trunk, which begins at the absurdly flared base and tapers dramatically to a point, setting it off in most landscapes. Flexible branches that are ascendant in youth and arch toward the ground at maturity grow off this tapered trunk. The tree is ripe for climbing. The branches appear scaled in size to a human arm in relation to the torso. It feels simultaneously anatomically correct and freakishly strapping to
Photo: Aa r o n Burden
Photo: Alan Gilbert
the eye, like an NBA player with rubber-clad size 16 shoes and a healthy wingspan. All this structure is balanced with a delicate lacey foliage that casts dappled shade, is lit to a golden green in summer sun, cools to a tarnished copper amidst fall’s clear blue skies, and blankets the ground in delicate mulch for the winter.
All these details await the careful observer. However, the real point of connection between tree and people takes place at the base. Flying buttresses of root take on a veiny appearance as they curve earthward from eight feet up the trunk. Beginning as ripples in the armpits of branches these sinuous lines take on grand proportions where they meet the ground. The crevices are often home to pockets of water, seedlings of plants, moss and lichens, and the occasional amphibian. The bark is soft, thin, and peels off in strips leaving behind a fibrous hair tempting to touch. All of this makes the Dawn Redwood endearing to us.
THE TREE FROM THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC
It’s appropriate that our Metaseqoia played an ambassadorial role, as the discovery and diaspora of this tree was made possible through international collaboration. Believed to have been extinct, the genus Metasequoia was only known in the fossil record for many years. In 1941, a Chinese forester, Professor T. Kan, noticed a living tree while traveling in Hubei Province of west central China. The discovery of this “living fossil,” known to indigenous Chinese as the Shui-sa or Water Fir, was sensationalized in print at the time. This tree would later provide the herbarium samples, collected by the principal of a local Agricultural High School, that lead to the “discovery” of Metasequoia glyptostroboides, making it the “botanical type tree.” Professor Hseuh Chi-ju, responsible for seed collection from the discovered tree, had this to say regarding the tree and its relationship to the community: “As the local people looked upon the Metasequoia as a sort of divine tree, they built a shrine beside it. Among the villagers there were quite a few traditions about the Metasequoia. As a result, the villagers considered its fruit-bearing condition to be an indication of the yield of crops, and the withering of its twigs or branches a forecast of someone’s death.”
For the very reasonable price of $250, E. D. Merril, Director of Harvard’s Arnold Arboretum,
Photo: Dia Matthews
commissioned a Chinese team to visit the tree and collect seeds. Nearly 600 seed packets were redistributed by the arboretum to public gardens and arboreta throughout the world. Some of these dispatches went to nearby Morris Arboretum and the Missouri Botanical Garden to name a few. Luckily, and proved by the abundance of seedlings on the Cylburn grounds, Metasequoia seeds tend to be fertile. The discovery and seed dispatches happened at a fortuitous time. Botanical collaboration around Metasequoia would be one of the last between the U.S. and China before the Chinese revolution ended western access, until 1980. Appreciation of trees is universal and knows no boundaries. Today, the survival of Metasequoia is undoubtedly linked to the network of arboreta and gardens that support conservation as well as the local culture that honored it originally.
REFLECTIONS
As a tree that shouldn’t be alive, a living fossil saved by humans, some could argue that Dawn Redwoods are nothing more than statuary – a frivolous erected folly. After all, there are no other species that rely upon Metasequoia for survival. Many of the tree’s obligates have presumably long been extinct. This disjunct status also renders the tree practically pestfree. The virtues of this tree may not reside in its contributions to the local ecosystem, but in its ability to bring people together.
As a gardener, I am keen on reminding all of us that gardens are for people. Our world is almost entirely contrived, built by man and constantly changing. We must maintain a home for anomalies like Metasequoia. Terms like green infrastructure and ecosystem services help legitimize and illustrate the need to invest in our connection to the living world at a level that transcends the personal. Within the urban environment, the need for ecosystem services, specifically from trees, is overwhelming. Temperature regulation and stormwater management alone elevate the value of trees and the importance of planting trees to a fundamentally pragmatic level. While resiliency plays a prime role in planting decisions, I would like to make a case for a tree's relatability, the subjective intersection between a tree’s beauty, intrigue, recognizability, and memorableness. Cylburn’s Dawn Redwood held this spell over its fans. Although green infrastructure takes place on a civic scale, we must never forget the importance of the appreciation of individual trees. Connecting to trees is at the heart of our stewardship responsibilities.
CELEBRATING
BY BROOKE FRITZ
For 70 years, Cylburn
Arboretum Friends (CAF) has supported this special place through stewardship and educational programming. The Cylburn Park Project, as it was then known, started in May 1954 through the establishment of a Steering Committee led by Josephine Hunley (Federated Garden Clubs of Maryland) and Elizabeth Clark (Baltimore City Recreation and Parks). During that first year, the group obtained official approval from the City to use the Cylburn property as the Cylburn Wildflower Preserve and Garden Center. The purpose was two fold: to enable adults and youth to understand and enjoy the out-of-doors and to preserve the existing natural beauty and facilities of “Cylburn Park.”
CAF has preserved the original aspirations of the group while growing to include new stewardship and educational goals. As early as 1955, the steering committee noted a desire to convert the historic carriage house into a trail-side museum. In 2023, CAF opened the Nature Education Center in a renovated and expanded carriage house, honoring the intentions of our early founders. Even the purpose of the Nature Center remained consistent, not to create a destination but a learning launch point, a place to get visitors excited to explore our trails, grounds and gardens.
In 1960, the Sunday Sun Magazine published an article written by John C. Schmidt that noted,
“Baltimore City’s newest park – Cylburn – is a living museum of the flowers and shrubs of Maryland. On its shaded trails and open slopes can be seen nearly all the wildflowers native to the State, as well as some unusual “naturalized” plants.” Today the property remains a living museum, with collections of boxwood (Buxus), dogwood (Cornus), false-cypress (Chamaecyparis), holly (Ilex), magnolia (Magnolia), maple (Acer), oak (Quercus), pine (Pinus) and spruce (Picea). In addition, with our focus on serving Baltimore City residents, we have a unique Small Tree Collection designed to demonstrate to urban residents, with smaller yards, appropriate types and arrangements of trees.
This year, as part of our 70th anniversary celebration, we initiated a project to reimagine multiple City Demonstration Gardens, which were originally designed in the 1980s to showcase potential landscape solutions for Baltimore City row houses. Knowing the importance of greenspaces and city stewardship, we are working with our city partners, landscape architects, and local garden clubs to revitalize five City Demonstration Gardens to inspire a new generation of garden enthusiasts and proud city residents.
On the next two pages, enjoy a timeline of some of our additional accomplishments over the years. Looking forward, we hope you will join us at Cylburn for our anniversary lecture series this fall or explore our new Nature Education Center. Every day we work to live our tagline – Where Baltimore Grows – and we hope to be doing it for another 70 years.
CYLBURN
BENCH
GRAVEL BAMBOO FENCE
Early volunteers and visitors, opposite and above, were an important part of Cylburn Parks success. Today, volunteer groups continue to be vital to our work. Groundsmith Collective design firm with members of the For-Win-Ash Garden Club, bottom left, discussing the City Demonstration Garden redesign project. A city garden concept drawing, bottom right, from FORM Garden Design.
Cylburn Arboretum is a public garden and arboretum owned by the City of Baltimore.
Vollmer Center: opened in 2010
OUR HISTORY
1942
The City of Baltimore purchased the Tyson estate at auction in 1942.
1954 1972
Since 1954, the Horticulture Division of Baltimore City’s Department of Recreation and Parks (BCRP) has managed the property. Cylburn Arboretum Friends, a non-profit organization, has partnered with the City of Baltimore ever since to maintain the grounds and gardens and to provide educational opportunities to the community. Our work is made possible by individuals, corporations, foundations, members and volunteers who share our mission.
By virtue of the arboretum’s contribution “in the fields of science and education,” the Cylburn mansion and most of the land was placed on the National Register in 1972.
Green Houses: built in 1959
Cylburn Mansion: Construction began in 1863 First Nature Museum: opened in 1961
Summer Nature Camp: started in 2011
First Market Day: held in 1968
1982 2006
On January 7, 1982 the Cylburn parkland was renamed Cylburn Arboretum, acknowledging the rich natural resources of the property and the long history of careful stewardship of its lawns, gardens, planted trees and natural woodland. Also that year, a newly renovated Cylburn Nature Museum opened on the third floor of the mansion.
In 2006 the Nature Museum collection was moved to the Cylburn Carriage House to be more accessible to visitors. The renovated space was called Exploration Station.
2023
Mansion Circle Garden: designed in 2011
Carriage House: 1870/NEC: 2023
ADDING GARDEN EDUCATION to Cylburn Nature Camp
BY ERIKA CASTILLO
We recently concluded our thirteenth year of Cylburn Summer Nature Camp. Every year, we combine developmentally appropriate educational and recreational activities for a summer of fun and learning! At Cylburn, we have more than 200 acres of gardens, woodland trails, and open space as our “classroom.” During camp, we investigate plants, trees, birds, insects, and fungi in our diverse Cylburn habitats. Each day begins with a morning trail hike where campers are encouraged to notice and explore nature around them, as well as the changes we are seeing at Cylburn from day to day. One thing that had not been a dominant part of our curriculum was the practice of gardening –even though as an organization we spend a great deal of time in the gardens and tree collections. This summer we added our Garden Educators, Ron Roberto and Rose Pacheco, to the camp team with great results.
Nature Camp or school field trips. I think that implementing garden education this summer enhanced the overall experience for campers and I look forward to continuing to weave it into our field trip curriculum as we interpret the new Silber Teaching Garden.
Towards the end of our camp season, we sat with Ron Roberto and asked about his experience implementing garden education into the camp curriculum. This is what he shared:
Working with elementary school campers, we practiced weeding and mulching and we also planted perennials. Before beginning any activity, I like to sit down with students and get to know them. For example, I asked our campers if any of them have gardened before. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that the majority of our young campers garden at home with their parents and grandparents. With the middle school campers, I introduced them to the concept of a woodland edge. (As a Chesapeake Conservation and Climate Corps member, my capstone project focused on restoring one of Cylburn’s woodland edges.) I explained to our campers the importance of forest management. We took a hike through the woods to look at the biodiversity of our forest, and then we looked at the site of my capstone project and talked about the impact an invasive vine like nonnative wisteria has on the ecosystem. After exploring the concept of a healthy forest, the middle school campers installed native plants in our woodlands. They planted whitewood aster (Eurybia divaricata), American coral bells (Heuchera americana), and bluestemmed goldenrod (Solidago caesia). I hope that my work with the campers this summer helped to deepen their connection to the property – so that they know that this is their space.
We hope that our campers will be future stewards of our Arboretum and of the planet we all inhabit. We spent our summer camp days creating space for young people to be inquisitive about nature and to grow in new ways outside of their homes and schools. It has been exciting to add garden education to our repertoire. With Rose, our
campers planted and watered seeds, watched a seed grow and root in a viewing chamber, and learned about tropical plants that can only live in our greenhouses (which they toured). Working with our Garden Educators will remain part of Cylburn Nature Camp for future years.
CYLBURN ARBORETUM FRIENDS INVITES YOU TO THE 2024-2025:
Speaker Series
PROGRAM BEGINS AT 5PM. DOORS OPEN AT 4:30PM.
Come early to meet Cylburn partners like the Baltimore Bird Club, the Horticultural Society of Maryland, Master Gardeners, and others.
SONIA SUCCAR FERRÉ
September 19, 2024
PASTOR MICHAEL S. MARTIN & YORELL TUCK
October 10, 2024
IMPLEMENTING NATURE-BASED SOLUTIONS IN URBAN SETTINGS:
Learn about Future-forward solutions that can support urbanization and nature-based infrastructure and better prepare communities for the impacts of climate change.
STILLMEADOW: A Story of Stewardship & Relationships
Hear how a small local church became a model for Resiliency Hubs nationwide through prioritizing community engagement, environmental stewardship, partnership, and vision.
MICHAEL GAIGE
November 15, 2024
HILTON CARTER
February 19, 2025
ERIN REED MILLER
March 12, 2025
ADAM MARTON
April 3, 2025
HIDDEN HISTORY IN CYLBURN’S FOREST:
Hear the hidden history of Cylburn’s grounds and forests based on his recent study and analysis.
CULTIVATING GROWTH:
Learn how plant care has shaped his life and relationships.
GARDENING FOR BIRDS AND BALTIMORE:
Learn how to transform your home, school, work, or community space into a native urban oasis!
CODE RED: Reporting on Baltimore’s Climate Divide
Hear a recap of the University of Maryland journalists’ examination of how rising temperatures driven by climate change are already affecting the health and lives of the residents of “urban heat islands” in Baltimore.
cylburn.org/programs-events
Questions: 410-367-2217 • cylburn.org TICKETS $5
FREE GIVEAWAY EACH EVENING
to the first 100 pre-registered guests starting at 4:30 pm. Taharka Brothers ice cream featured on Sep, 19, 2024. ollmer Visitor Center THE VOLLMER CENTER 4915 Greenspring Avenue Baltimore, Maryland 21209
MEET THE SPEAKERS
SONIA SUCCAR FERRÉ
the founder and president of Futura Climate Strategies. Sonia has 15 years of experience across various sectors, including leadership roles in government, private, nonprofit, and philanthropy. After working for Turner Construction, Sonia worked for the City of Miami and was instrumental in developing the city’s first Climate Action Plan. She then became the first Environmental Manager for the City of Coral Gables’ sustainability program, where she led the development of their Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan, and Tree Canopy Plan. Sonia collaborated with 26 cities worldwide to redefine conservation and prioritize the needs of communities that are experiencing rapid urbanization and the public and social health effects of climate change. She earned a Master’s degree in Environmental Management and Sustainable Development from Harvard University, where she explored fuel costs and congestion with wireless electric vehicle technology.
PASTOR MICHAEL S. MARTIN
has had careers in corporate as a Human Resources professional, an entrepreneur establishing consulting offices in several U.S. cities and serving the last decades as a pastor in southern California. In 2017, he and his wife, Gail, relocated to her hometown of Baltimore to help revive Stillmeadow Community Fellowship. Since, they have discovered the joyful responsibility and divine connection between stewardship for God’s creation and care for the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual well-being of community residents in the 10 acres of the newly christened Stillmeadow PeacePark and Education/Retreat Center.
“Bringing what occurs in the church out to their forest; and taking the beauty, the contemplation so easily accomplished in nature back into the place of planned worship and wonder.”
YORELL TUCK
Born and raised in Baltimore City, Yorell Tuck forged a career teaching and mentoring youth and young adults. She went from working as a College Campus Minister with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship USA at Bucknell University to Director of Providence House Maternity Home for teens. She, later, had the honor
of working as a Student Life Counselor for middle and high school students at The SEED School of Maryland for 12 years.
She has, now, settled into serving in the Southwest Baltimore community with her lifelong church, Stillmeadow Community Fellowship, and its 501(c) (3) nonprofit organization, Stillmeadow Community Projects, Inc. As the Director of Operations, Yorell has had the opportunity to expand her reach in serving residents of her beloved hometown. She engages people of all ages and walks of life through facilitating Stillmeadow’s array of programs offered through the Stillmeadow PeacePark, resiliency hub and food distribution, and the Stillmeadow PeacePark Learning Center.
MICHAEL GAIGE
is an independent consulting ecologist from upstate New York. His work explores the intersection of natural and cultural history using field evidence and archives to reconstruct land use history. Michael works with organizations, design teams, and private landowners on historical ecology inventories, park and landscape design projects, and conservation planning for natural areas. He has an affinity for large old trees, their ecological values and the stories they tell about landscape change. Michael holds an MS from Antioch University and BA from Prescott College and has taught field studies programs at several colleges and universities for more than 15 years. www.KnowYourLand.com
HILTON CARTER
For Hilton Carter, it all started with one plant– a fiddle-leaf fig named Frank, to be exact. As he explains in his best-selling book, Wild at Home: How to style and care for beautiful plants, his interest in plants started out as purely practical. Hilton Carter is a plant + interior stylist, author, and artist. He has a loyal following on Instagram (@hiltoncarter), where he shares his knowledge of plant care and interior styling with the design and green loving community. When not getting his hands dirty in a project, Hilton can be found cozying up in his Baltimore home with his wife Fiona, and daughter, Holland.
Publications include: Wild Interiors: Beautiful plants in beautiful spaces (2020), Wild Creations (2021), Living Wild
WHERE BALTIMORE GROWS
(2023), and The Propagation Handbook (2024). He will be featured on PBS-TV’s Living Wild: Plant-spiration with Hilton Carter, nationally airing late-February through early March 2024.
ERIN REED MILLER
is the Senior Coordinator of Bird-Friendly Communities for Audubon Mid-Atlantic’s Baltimore program, which is part of National Audubon Society. Erin grew up in Pennsylvania before earning her BS in Wildlife Conservation and MS in Wildlife Ecology from the University of Delaware. There she researched the connection between native plant species and insect communities in the lab of Dr. Doug Tallamy, author of Bringing Nature Home. She has since served as an interpretive naturalist and environmental educator in Delaware, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. Erin has been at Audubon since 2011, as an Educator, Education Manager, and now Bird-Friendly Communities Coordinator, where she works with communities to thoughtfully increase bird-friendly habitat while meeting those communities’ varied goals. In 2016, Erin was named the Tamar Chotzen Audubon Educator of the Year.
ADAM MARTON
is an award-winning data journalist specializing in visual storytelling, code and design.
Marton is on the faculty at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at The University of Maryland where he oversees the data and graphics bureau of Capital News Service and teaches data journalism and visual design courses.
Marton has been a top editor on many impactful journalism projects at Merrill, including Printing Hate, winner of the Punch Sulzberger Award for Innovative Storytelling, which explored the racist past of white-owned newspapers, and Code Red, winner of the National Press Foundation’s 2019 Innovative Storytelling Award, which examined the relationship between climate change and poverty.
Marton worked at The Baltimore Sun for 13 years, where he led the data and graphics desk in the newsroom. He designed and built many projects for The Sun, including “The 45 Minute Mystery of Freddie Gray’s Death,” which was a 2015 Pulitzer Prize finalist.
MARK YOUR CALENDAR
SEPTEMBER 4: Volunteer Orientation
SEPTEMBER 5: Gardeners Workshop
SEPTEMBER 13: Horticulture Culture
SEPTEMBER 18: Wednesday Walk
OCTOBER 3: Gardeners Workshop
OCTOBER 11: Horticulture Culture
OCTOBER 16: Wednesday Walk
NEC DROP-IN PROGRAMMING EVERY SATURDAY AT 11AM
THANK YOU
We can’t thank you enough for being part of our community at Cylburn Arboretum Friends—your support and participation is the foundation of our success.
