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Leaflet A MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY PUBLICATION

NOVEMBER 2023

TABLE OF CONTENTS 3 4 6 7 8 13 14 18 24 28

From the President's Desk James Hearsum Winter MHS Classes Festival of Trees Tickets Giving Tuesday Wish List In First Person: Jill Nooney Ulmus glabra 'Camperdownii' By Marianne Orlando Harvest Season By Catherine Cooper From the Stacks By Maureen T. O'Brien Appreciation By John Lee 2023 Garden Opening Sponsors Illustrations by Marianne Orlando

CONTACT EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Wayne Mezitt

waynem@westonnurseries.com

MANAGING EDITOR Meghan Connolly

mconnolly@masshort.org

FROM THE PRESIDENT'S DESK “To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.” So said Audrey Hepburn in 1954, and it remains a simple and profound truth today. At this time of year, our team is placing tulips, alliums and many other geophytes into the ground, knowing it will get colder and darker over winter, but in the sure and certain hope that the turning of the season will bring 60,000 blooms to welcome the spring. One of the core values of the MHS team that sets us apart is optimism, a positive daily choice to seek the good and expect the best, to assume growth. It is essential for all gardeners, and a daily practice that can lift your eyes from your own troubles and give purpose in serving the good of others. I have been reminded of this again in days of trouble and anger in the world around us. Gardening is a hopeful vocation, and one that lifts us out of many of our daily concerns. At the same time, we want to see the hopeful and optimistic character of our gardening lives spread out into communities around us. It is for this reason we believe that growing plants together has a community and global impact, and why we focus on our character as a membership organization. We want to seek opportunities to bring individuals and communities together through our work.

To this end, this summer has seen a period of reaching out and planting seeds of friendship with other organizations with missions like ours. We have been delighted to receive support from our elected representatives for studies relating to Elm Bank access and to have initiated very positive new conversations with Brian Arrigo, Commissioner of the Department for Conservation and Recreation and with the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources. Our elected officials and support agencies have an eye to the future and to working partnerships they can depend on, and we are being sure to be good partners. Similarly, the public gardens and conservation organizations work closely together to support and share best practices, as seen in the photo below of public garden CEOs from across New England meeting at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens last month. And many, many more relationships—personal and professional—are growing from the network of people and activities that comprise Massachusetts Horticultural Society. As our members and volunteers, you remain the most important part of all of this. It is through your support and activity that we are able to form and sustain community, and ultimately act to help people live better lives through horticulture. We have a grand and hopeful vision, a strengthening network, and wonderful opportunities. Thank you for being a part of it! I encourage you to engage more deeply – give to our annual fund, attend our events and classes, make new friends and grow with us. James Hearsum President & Executive Director

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WINTER Guided Winter Garden Tours REGISTER Winter garden tours are back! Bundle up and enjoy the garden in a different light. Join us for a morning tour highlighting plants with winter interests, garden history, and things to keep an eye out for in the spring months. Thursday, January 25 at 10-11:30am Saturday, February 3 at 10-11:30am Wednesday, February 7 at 10-11:30am

Floral Design Classes Floral Design; The Colors in Autumn NOVEMBER 11 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST Floral Design; Stunning Holiday Arrangement DECEMBER 9 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST

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CLASSES NOVEMBER 11 Floral Design; The Colors in Autumn 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST NOVEMBER 14 Designing the Naturalistic Pollinator Garden: 3 Session Workshop 10:00 AM - 2:00 PM EST NOVEMBER 28 Holiday Card Workshop; Celebrating the Season 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM EST DECEMBER 1 Studio Focus: Festive Fruits on Vellum 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM EST Virtual DECEMBER 9 Floral Design; Stunning Holiday Arrangement 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST DECEMBER 13 Holiday Wreath Workshop 10:30 AM - 12:30 PM EST JANUARY 5 Graphite Studies: Form, Pattern, and Texture 9:30 AM - 3:30 PM EST JANUARY 8 Drawing the Wonders of Natural Forms in Graphite 9:30 AM - 3:30 PM EST JANUARY 25 Guided Winter Garden Tours 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST

JANUARY 29 Foundations of Botanical Drawing & Painting 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM EST Virtual OR Hybrid JANUARY 30 Techniques of Botanical Drawing and Painting 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM EST Hybrid, Virtual & In-Person FEBRUARY 3 Shadow Play: The Drama of a Botanical Still Life on Vellum 9:30 AM - 12:30 PM EST Guided Winter Garden Tours 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST FEBRUARY 7 Guided Winter Garden Tours 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM EST MARCH 5 Creating a Succession of Bloom in the Native Garden 6:30 PM - 8:30 PM EST Virtual MARCH 12 Planting The Year-Round Pollinator Garden 6:30 PM - 7:30 PM EDT Virtual MARCH 26 Achieving Luminosity with Color Pencils 9:30 AM - 3:30 PM EDT

VIEW FULL CALENDAR MHS Leaflet | 5

Tickets Now on Sale to MHS Members Get your tickets today!

Your Membership ID is needed to grant access to member pricing. You can find your ID number on your membership card. If you can't locate your ID number, please contact our membership department at membership@masshort.org. PURCHASE TICKETS HERE

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Support MHS This Giving Tuesday Through our Amazon Wish List! In just two weeks on November 28, many people around the world will participate in Giving Tuesday. It is a global day of giving which kicks off the holiday season of generosity. Join us this year for Giving Tuesday and support Massachusetts Horticultural Society.

This Giving Tuesday, we are placing a spotlight on our Amazon Wish List. Carefully chosen by the MHS staff, this list features items that will grow our Education programs, the Garden and our Facilities, from new books to gardening tools and equipment. Please explore our Wish List and between now and Giving Tuesday, purchase an item (or two or three!). Giving Tuesday is not just about making a donation, it’s about making an impact! And your purchase will help us make the world a better place through horticulture. A sample of high priority items:

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In First Person Jill Nooney

Horticulturist, sculptor, MHS Silver Medal winner, and psychotherapist Jill Nooney, with her physician and ‘can do anything' husband Bob Munger, bought the Lee, NH property that is now Bedrock Gardens in 1980, applying their mutual skills and passions to develop and display plants, sculpture, and art. Over the years they’ve welcomed many visitors to their gardens, and in the early 2000’s began the arduous endeavor to convert their property into a public garden. After countless challenges, they finalized the donation of their private creation to the public ownership of The Friends of Bedrock Gardens in June 2023. Here’s how Jill describes this process. From Maria Papova

‘There is an elemental cosmic loneliness in the pit of every human soul. We spend our lives trying to make it bearable and call our efforts love, or art. Every once in a while, we are lifted out of the pit into a salutary sense of connection and congress with something larger.’ For me this garden provides that sense of connection and solace. It keeps me company -with its pulsing chlorophyl and stunning beauty

Of course I created the garden to indulge my creative juices, my plant collecting lust, as a repository for my restless energy, but really underneath it all, I created it to bring me some peace and to soothe my soul. 8 | November 2023

My soul not yours. I felt I was helping others heal though my practice of psychotherapy. This was mine, my private sanctuary, my play pen. Mine mine mine mine mine. So how did it all of this happen? By accident.

As the years of garden making rolled by, I decided the garden needed some art. This was to be a turning point.

I began making art inspired by the old farm equipment lying around. I made so many pieces, that I started selling them on two weekends a year using the garden as my gallery. It was so slow and I was so bored I threw in some tours. Before long folks began coming for the tours in numbers too large for me to lead so we made a map and they toured themselves. When I got over being pissed off that more folks were not buying my art and gradually calmed down, I began to listen to what visitors were saying.

I didn’t believe them, it felt like flattery. It felt like hyperbole. I was suspicious.

completely different. It was weird. I saw the weeds, the plants that needed to be rearranged, all the works in progress screaming for attention. One guy said he could feel the love and he swished his arm around the ground like he was walking in a cloud. What? ! pause

But, I knew he was right.

I had come to believe them.

The garden brought a sense of peace and calm and delight to them too. After hearing this kind of feedback enough, it began to feel like what right do we have to keep this all for ourself. And, by the way what are we going to do with it? I have always felt that land cannot be truly owned, we just borrow it for a while like those before us and those after. We all are just passing through just a brief speck of something.

This began a ten year process of nurturing a grass roots organization of folks interested in turning it into a public garden.

We were looking at the same garden and they saw something By 2016 it was time to fish or

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cut bait. Did we have a fighting chance to pull this off? To provide direction I invited leaders of public gardens in the area, Coastal Maine, Tower Hill, the Arnold Arboretum, Chanticleer, Berkshire Botanic to what we called a two day Summit. And we asked them. Do we?

‘Most private gardens don’t have a chance”, Bill Cullina said,’ but the combination of unusual horticulture, a unique art collection and original garden design make your chances good.’

Bill Cullina also said few gardens have the fortitude, the support and the resources to overcome the obstacles often inevitable in becoming a public garden. How did we do it?

With a lot of help from our friends. One friend, a future board member came to the donation tent up by the house that we used at the time and without experiencing more than the driveway said I would like to make a $250 donation.

So we went from being open What? one weekend a month to two weekends a month. Another, a recent transplant from Alaska said ’what is this place?’ and Our popularity grew rapidly but I cheekily said why don’t you come our problems outpaced it. to a board meeting tomorrow. And so he did and became another Many of you may remember board member. having to park at Mast Way school and be shuttled to the garden When the planning board wanted and the police details, but you verification of the suitability probably did not know about the of my landscape design plan Planning Board meetings with from a ‘professional’ - a friend expert testimony by a traffic volunteered to satisfy them. engineer, the state fire marshal, a Many spoke on our behalf at the civil engineer, two lawyers and the Planning Board and others were commissioner of agriculture. Our ready with hugs of support. lawyer said a typical approval for a Walmart application is between And then, when we were required 4 and 5 meetings, we endured 22 to build a parking lot to allow us to over the course of 2 and a half continue, an angel jumped in and years. This was an awesomely single handedly pushed us over painful process. the starting line. I mean really, it is astounding.

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dream it up, I can make it happen. He has more skills than anyone I know and a delight in filling in the gaps he might need. He might be I like to say that we have done the the most patient person I know easy part in creating the garden chewing away at problems and and it is up to you all to do the hard never throws the wrench like so part to keep it going but really many of my fabricators or gets you have already done so much to irritated when I throw my mouse bring us to this point safeguarding at him. this sacred place for others to He is just an all-around exceptional enjoy past our lifetimes. person and we really are a dream We thank you from the bottom of team. The garden has been our love affair with each other with our hearts. this piece of land and now with Oops I left out an important piece. our expanding circle of folks who know the power of a garden, to Bob. soothe the cosmic loneliness Anyone who knows us, knows this with its aching beauty, calm and constancy. is the garden that Bob built. They are all angels, you are all angels. And there are so many more.

Bob makes everyone look good, Thank you. especially me. He says if you can

PRESS PLAY OR CLICK THE PHOTO TO WATCH JILL'S TALK.

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Camperdown Elm Ulmus glabra 'Camperdownii' With beautiful foliage throughout the spring, summer, and into fall, cooler weather reveals the fascinating growth of this deciduous tree. Characteristic of the Camperdown Elm, its winding branches give the tree weeping foliage. The tree is actually a graft of an upright elm with a weeping form. The horizontal line shows where the graft occurs. The Camperdown is a cultivar of the Wych (or Scotch) Elm, upon which the low-growing, creeping Camperdown grows. You can find two Camperdown Elms in the Italianate Garden.

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Marianne Orlando is a landscape architect turned freelance illustrator who loves plants, and does commissioned drawings of homes, pets and people. You can see samples of her work at www.marianneorlando.com.

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HARVEST SEASON

By Catherine Cooper 14 | November 2023

ovember is a month of transitioning. The vibrant colors of fall have mostly disappeared with oaks and beech being the only trees still clutching on to their bleached cloaks of leaves. Other plants are settling into winter dormancy and other than finishing off the fall clean-up the growing season is done for the year. It is a time where we spend more time indoors and thoughts turn to the winter holidays and family time that holidays such as Thanksgiving bring. Thanksgiving in particular is a time to appreciate not only family and friends, but hopefully the bounty of home grown crops. If the growing season has been kind, and we gardeners have done things right we can enjoy and reflect upon the pleasures and successes of growing our own food. Vegetables such as squash, root crops and brassicas can all feature in Thanksgiving dinners, and for gardeners it is an added satisfaction to savor the wonderful flavor that home-grown produce brings.

In my household, depending on what growing decisions were made earlier in the year, we can enjoy butternut squash, carrots, parsnips and cabbage, for which all of the credit goes to my husband, not me. My contribution to our harvest feast lies in the raspberries that have been frozen through the growing season, which I grow as much as anything because my parents also grew them.

I have red and yellow raspberries, twenty four plants in total, which didn’t seem much when they arrived as small, bare-rooted canes, but now form a long, dense row. Of these twenty four plants, six are the variety Heritage, six Anne and the rest Boyne. Heritage and Anne have settled into being fall fruiting while Boyne is summer fruiting. My plants are set in a row with posts and wire strands onto which I can tie the canes, and this worked well for a few years while the plants were still young. Now mature, the canes have a mind of their own and their suckers sprout well away from their supports, making supporting many of the canes impossible. However, even if I tie up some of the canes in fall there is a chance that winter cold will cut them back and not only have I wasted my time, but have now added to my tasks by having to cut out the lashed canes that have died, Therefore, I no longer tend to do anything with the canes in the fall as I have learnt to see what is viable come the spring. One thing my parents never had to contend with was deer; interestingly their problems lay in protecting the fruit from birds, but nothing would eat the plants themselves. And

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it seems that deer find the tips of raspberry canes rather tasty. Not only will they prune them in winter when there’s not much to eat, but they also like to sample them in spring when the new growth pushes out. Here my Boyne raspberries now get off to a slow start as they overcome deer damage to some degree or another each spring. The fall fruiting varieties have longer to recover but it means I have only

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once experienced a farm stand worthy summer harvest. Just as well really, as there are only so many raspberries two people can consume or freeze or turn into jelly. It also means that I generally don’t spend two hours each evening for a couple of weeks in the summer picking fruit while fending off mosquitoes.

While I realize that last comment makes it sound like fruit picking is a chore, I actually enjoy picking raspberries. It’s something of a challenge to find all the ripe fruit, as while many are easily visible a good number are hidden behind the leaves. Therefore raspberry picking is a focused task of looking behind leaves and lifting the smaller canes that lean down to the ground when laden with berries. I am not the only one focused on tasks while picking. Raspberries are pollinated for the most part by bumblebees and to the accompaniment of their buzzing, they and I go about our business without bothering each other. One year I realized the bees and I are not the only ones intently focussed on one thing. In reaching into the depths of the canes for a raspberry my hand passed within an inch of a mature praying mantid that was also concentrating on something. As my attention was given over to red fruit, I barely even noticed the bees and certainly didn’t immediately notice the master of disguise that was the mantid. Only having pulled my hand back did I see it and it was still intent on its task: dinner. I watched it for a few seconds, but as it remained motionless I retuned to my picking. A few minutes later I returned to see if it had moved to discover that its patience had paid off, and it was calmly eating a bumblebee, hairy legs and all, while all the other bees carried on as if nothing had happened. Gross as this may sound, I appreciate being able to witness various aspects of the natural world; in this case both bumblebees and mantids doing their thing. So yes, whenever we get to eat something we have grown, it brings to mind the labor to bring our crops to harvest while dealing with the challenges of weather, pests and diseases. We get to recall all the trials and tribulations and ultimately the pleasure of achieving something satisfying and which we can then share with those we hold dear. Born in England, Catherine learned to garden from her parents and from that developed a passion for plants. Catherine is in charge of the greenhouse at Weston Nurseries Chelmsford. When not at Weston Nurseries, she can often be found in her flower beds or tending to an ever-increasing collection of houseplants.

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You have to know the past to understand the present.

Carl Sagan (1934-1996)

Last month’s “From the Stacks” told the history of the Society’s headquarters during its first 171 years. Its mission “to promote the art and science of horticulture,” while staying true to its founding motto, ‘Commune Bonum,’ (for the public good) has remained constant throughout the Society’s 194year history. Its move to Elm Bank in 2001 provided a new opportunity to fulfill that mission in the twenty-first century. Featured Collection: Elm Bank This month’s article provides a brief history of Elm Bank Reservation, site of the Society’s headquarters.

PRE-COLONIAL HISTORY Elm Bank is in an area known as the “Natick Plain” and is bordered on three sides by the Charles River and by a woodland on its fourth side. While little is known about indigenous history in the area, there is evidence of fishing, hunting, agriculture use and burial. Future archeological excavation may reveal additional history. COLONIAL PERIOD Elm Bank, originally part of Dedham,1 was granted to the Fairbanks family in the 17th century. By the 18th century, the Fuller family owned the property. In 1732, Thomas Fuller (1662-1733) sold 40 acres to Hezikiah Fuller (1687-1756). In 1740, Colonel John Jones, Jr. (1716-1801) purchased the property, and expanded it to 72 acres. He built the first house, barn and greenhouse on the property and planted the first elm trees. Dover was incorporated as a town in 1836.

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POST-COLONIAL PERIOD In 1804, when Israel Loring (1741-1820) purchased the property from Jones’ son for $3,000, it was 102 acres. Theodore Otis (1810-1873,) a politician from Roxbury, bought the property in 1870, as a summer retreat and named it “Elm Bank." By that time, Elm Bank was 147 acres and one of the largest farms in Dover. Otis was a “Gentleman Farmer” and added additional greenhouses and raised livestock.

This plan depicts Elm Bank prior to the sale to Benjamin Cheney. It shows that it was 147 acres and bounded on three sides by the Charles River. Note the sketch of the Jones farmhouse, surrounded by elms, in the upper right-hand corner. The H. H. Hunnewell Estate is located across the Charles River annotated along the bottom of the map. Plan of Elm Bank Farm in Dover … the Property of the Heirs of the late Theodore Otis, Esq. H.H. Moses, Surveyor, Boston; Thompson &Ramsey Lith., Boston, 1874. Society’s Collections.

◁ Jones Farmhouse (1740-1875). The elm trees seen above, were an important factor in siting the subsequent Cheney Mansion. Image: Jones Farmhouse, Courtesy of Natick Historical Society.

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CHENEY PERIOD (1874-1915) After Otis’ death, Benjamin P. Cheney (1818-1895) acquired Elm Bank in 1874, at auction for $10,000 to occupy as a summer retreat. Cheney was a wellrespected, successful businessman and a prominent member of this Society. Cheney undertook a dramatic transformation of Elm Bank into a Country Place Era Estate. In 1875, he razed the Jones farmhouse and hired architect John Andrews Fox (1836–1920),2 “Father of Stick Style architecture,” to design a Queen Victorian mansion in the same location as the farmhouse. This location provided a view from every window over the landscape and the Charles River. Fox also designed other buildings at Elm Bank, including the shingle and stucco Tudor revival style Superintendent and Gardener Cottages that are the oldest structures at Elm Bank today. Two wooden bridges were on the property: one where the present Cheney Bridge is today and a smaller one on the south side of the property. The greenhouses were extended, one of which was 100 feet long to grow prize winning chrysanthemums. The landscape included typical Country Era Estate features such as curving drives that concealed and gradually revealed views to the landscape and house. The landscape was adorned with Victorian carpet gardens, 16 acres of lawn, groves, meadows, bridle trails and English woods. It had threefourths of a mile of hedges, a fern conservatory, cow pasture, cart paths and woodland. The meadow and five miles of trails and carriage paths were open to the public. After Cheney’s death, his widow and son managed the property. They increased Elm Bank to 235 acres and replaced the Cheney Bridge.

Cheney Mansion c. 1890. The mansion was sited in the same location as the Jones Farmhouse, on a hill amidst the old elms. Note the topography of the site was not changed. Image: Society’s Collections.

2 Fox was married to Josephine Clapp (1854-1927), sister to Cheney’s spouse, Elizabeth Stickney Cheney, nee Clapp (1839-1922).

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BALTZELL ERA (1905-1938) Cheney’s daughter, Alice Steele Cheney (1867-1938) acquired Elm Bank in 1905 and converted it to a year-round residence. Public access to the property ceased. In 1907, she married Dr. William Hewson Baltzell, Jr. (1858-1928), a retired physician from Maryland. They made dramatic changes to Elm Bank. The Baltzells used Elm Bank as a showplace for entertainment, including fox hunts and garden parties. Twenty-seven workers were employed at the estate. The Victorian mansion was razed and they hired Carrére and Hastings, architects of the New York Public Library and the old Senate and House Office Buildings in Washington D.C. to design a Neo-Georgian brick and Vermont marble Manor. The Manor design related its rooms with the landscape. On the first floor, it has marble floors, a ballroom, a music room and a library modeled on that of Sir Walter Scott. Other structures added to the site by the Baltzell’s include: 1910 Boat House 1920 Carriage House 1920 Tool Shed/Plant Cellar (roof serves as the terrace for the Temple Garden) 1920 Small Bridge over the Olmsted Canal 1920 Tennis courts 1930 Garage

Carrére & Hastings designed the original gardens. In 1914, Percival Gallagher (1874–1934) of the Olmsted firm was hired to revise the landscape and add new features. While he retained many elements of the Estate, he redesigned the Formal Garden (Italianate Garden), and designed the Temple Garden and Water Garden (Asian Garden). The Elm Bank landscape was featured in several prominent publications and Alice Baltzell was awarded the Hunnewell Medal by the Society in 1937. She died in 1938. Her husband predeceased her. STIGMATINE FATHERS OCCUPANCY (1941-1976) In 1941, Elm Bank was sold to the Stigmatine Fathers, a Roman Catholic religious order that operated a high school seminary on the property. They built the Education Building in 1957, added a swimming pool and operated a children’s camp on the property. While the use of Elm Bank changed, no significant changes were made to the buildings or landscape.

Right: Brochure for Camp Elm Bank operated by the Stigmatine Fathers. Society's Collections. Left: Postcard of the Asian Garden during the Stigmatine era that features the red cypress bridge in the foreground. In the distance, an open view to the Charles River is seen with the historic Elms that lined the drive and the small bridge over the Olmsted Canal. Society’s Collections.

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COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS 1976 – Present In 1976, the Commonwealth bought the 182-acre Elm Bank property from the Stigmatine Fathers for $4.2 million. The property retains its historic peninsular shape, surrounded on three sides by the Charles River. The brick building adjacent to the greenhouses, now called the Putnam Building, was added in 1980. After the purchase, the Commonwealth Center for Higher Technology and the Quinobin Regional Vocational Technical School used the property. Both schools closed by 1986. In 1987, Elm Bank was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 1996, the Society leased 36 acres of Elm Bank for 99 years. In 2001, the Society moved its headquarters to Elm Bank and embarked on a new era to continue its enduring mission into the twenty-first century and serve as a caretaker of this historic site.

Image: Aerial Shot of "Elm Bank" The W. H. Baltzell Estate, Wellesley, MA (JOB #6058). Olmsted Archives, National Parks Service. Society’s Archives. (undated, likely 1930s)

Above is a bird’s eye view of the Elm Bank Estate adjacent to the Manor during the Baltzell era. Can you locate where the following features in the Society’s Gardens at Elm Bank are today? You will find the answers in the next Leaflet. 1. Bressingham Garden 2. Charles River 3. Daylily Garden 4. Exit Road 5. Goddess Garden 6. Herb Garden 7. Hunnewell Building 8. Italianate Garden 9. Jim Crockett Memorial Garden

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10. Manor House 11. Maple Grove 12. Wildflower Meadow 13. Noanett Native Plant Garden 14. Olmsted Asian Garden 15. Reservation Road 16. Rhododendron Garden 17. Seed to Table Vegetable Garden 18. Trial Garden

MHS Book Club

The next meeting of the Book Club is on Tuesday, November 21st at 1:30 pm. in the Education Building. The club will be discussing Otherwise Normal People: Inside the Thorny World of Competitive Rose Gardening by Aurelia C. Scott. All are welcome to attend.

This is the line-up of the Club's upcoming book discussions: » December 19: Strange Bright Blooms: A History of Cut Flowers by Randy Malamud » January 16, 2024: Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer » February 20, 2024: Brave the Wild River: The Untold Story of Two Women Who Mapped the Botany of the Grand Canyon by Melissa Sevigny » March 19, 2024: The Seed Keeper by Diane Wilson

Come Visit

The Library is open on Thursdays from 10 am to 1 pm, by appointment and when the lights are on. Members have borrowing privileges. Please email Library & Archives Manager Maureen O’Brien for an appointment if you want to schedule a visit. Check out the “Little Free Library” in front of the Education Building. You will find magazines, pamphlets and duplicate copies of books from the Library, all free! Inside the Library, we have some special books for sale.

Thanksgiving Day is a good day to recommit our energies to giving thanks and just giving. Amy Grant (b. 1960)

Thank you to the Library volunteers who enthusiastically work to preserve and share the Society’s historical resources. This year they grew, digitized, inventoried, organized, discovered and mended our collections for the enjoyment and study by the public and future generations. None of this could be accomplished without the generous time and effort of these twelve women. Our Volunteers are again building a tree for this year’s Festival of Trees. Come and admire their “Read, Grow and Enjoy” tree!

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APPRECIATION

By John Lee John shares stories of Bert and Brenda and their gardening wisdom. These chronicles feature recipes, tried-and-true gardening practices, and seasonal struggles and successes. Bert and Brenda were first introduced in the March 2022 issue of Leaflet.

The undeniable truth was at hand: the later mornings and earlier evenings were now here for all to see. Hoar was prevalent most every morning when Bert stepped outside only to shiver slightly before the rising sun cleared the near horizon and brought a little warmth to his bones. Certainly, this was one of his favorite times of the year. Forest and Sue B had been returned to their rightful home and he and Brenda were again more or less home alone to recapitulate. How was it that another season had flown by albeit this year in rather remarkable manner. For the first time ever they had had ‘children’ under their roof and had kept them feed and busy since the end of May. Yes, Forest had, indeed, helped Bert in his gardens and kept his equipment in good working order as best he could. He had even mineral oiled all of the wooden-handled spades and forks so they’d be ready for the next growing season. He had also cleaned, greased and changed the oil on anything that had an engine. This generosity of spirit pleased both Bert and Brenda no end because, honestly, toward the end of the growing season, Bert had begun to run

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out of steam. But more to the point, Forest’s interest in taking care of things had vastly changed. When they had taken him under their wing at the start of the growing season, Forest had proudly claimed that the only thing that got him excited was, as he said, ’racing and chasing’ (cars and girls). If reluctantly, Forest had seemed to come to an accommodation with a more sedentary and responsible productive lifestyle - one more focused on care and creation. It was Brenda’s fondest hope that this apparent appreciation of self-care would be carried forward into his young life. Sue B, on the other hand, clearly had been less receptive to Brenda’s earnest efforts to inculcate some of the virtues of domesticity. Frankly, she still had little interest in what came out of the gardens nevermind in the preservation of the harvest either for future consumption or to enhance the appearance or flavor of what might otherwise be a bland or unexciting dish as the larder thinned. If asked, Sue B would tell you that she saw no virtue in time wasted before the stove when, for almost no effort, perfectly acceptable food could be had for the asking if one would pick up the phone or catch a ride to the supper. Brenda

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thought this was the height of laziness at best and the precursor to a life of malnutrition at worst. It had been her mistaken belief that Sue B might be more amenable to mentorship than her brother. But such was not the case. She was stubbornly obdurate about how responsibility might be defined and even cared little about her personal appearance which really upset Brenda though she usually bit her tongue rather than make a bad matter worse.

Now that the county and 4-H fair season was behind them, Bert and Brenda settled down in the late fall with the usual ribbons and honorable mentions that accrue to veteran gardeners and home-makers. Recently, they had suggested that it might be a kindly thought if individual ladies aid societies in the area put together boxes of fresh and put-by items that might be shared with shut-ins in their neighborhoods who were less fortunate or less capable of comestible self-care. On darker days, Brenda imagined what their lives might be like were Bert to be unable to provide their kitchen with his annual bounty or she unable to cook, can or freeze that which gave them both such inestimable pleasure and satisfaction. As provincial as it might seem, both were horrified at the thought losing their self-reliance individually or together. That was a

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fate worse than death, an unimaginable handicap – worse than having to live in the ‘motel’ in the village that currently provided requisite refuge for some seniors who could no longer fend for themselves.

Such glum thoughts never lasted very long. Both still reveled in the changing seasons whether the days were waxing or waning. Each change each year brought its own satisfactions and expectations for the days to come. As time flew by these days, this time of year was the season of satisfaction and appreciation days and weeks just passed. Despite the cool damp weather, Bert (with Forest’s help) had grown enough food to get them through the winter and Brenda, his ’better half’ he often said, fed them three meals a day and put by enough to get them through to the succeeding growing season when the alluring photos in the seed catalogues became food on their plates.

John Lee is the recently retired manager of MHS Gold Medal winner Allandale Farm, Cognoscenti contributor and president of MA Society for Promoting Agriculture. He sits on the Governor's Food Policy Council and UMASS Board of Public Overseers and is a longtime op-ed contributor to Edible Boston and other publications.

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SILVER

BRONZE

PLATINUM

THANK YOU TO OUR 2023 GA

28 | November 2023

The Julie and Dennis Murphy

ARDEN OPENING SPONSORS

y Family Foundation

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The Garden at Elm Bank Open April 1-November 22 Classes, Programs Year-round www.masshort.org

Massachusetts Horticultural Society 900 Washington St Wellesley, MA 617.933.4900