The Providential Gardener

Do You Know Where the Gardens 'Used to Be'?

Find out where some of the farms and gardens used to be (and may still be!) in Providence, RI, at the new development website: www.wherethegardens.providentialgardener.com! The idea for this project came out of a planning meeting for Providence's 375th birthday celebration in 2011. However, there is a LOT of material and there's a LOT of research to do, so I think I've found how to keep myself occupied indefinitely! But this is also meant to be a collaborative project and I am looking for others who want to become contributors.

I will be adding more gardens soon and welcome stories and photos of these and other gardens. I'm going to be adding features and content types -- I also welcome suggestions of what kinds of information to include. Send email, or add comments to the pages.

Next month when 2012 arrives, this project that documents our local agricultural heritage will expand to all of Rhode Island. It already has been fun to find out about gardens on the Biltmore Hotel in the 1920s and peach orchards in Little Compton before the 1938 hurricane. Whenever I tell someone about Where the Gardens 'Used to Be' they return the favor by telling me what they know about a long-gone farm or garden. The latest was that TF Green airport was once farmland -- not surprising, really, when you think about it, but who among us remembers it back in that day?

We are so much more familiar with our state's machinery/industrial past than our sustenance/farming past. I hope Where the Gardens will contribute another dimension to Rhode Island's rich history and show us how more food can be grown again in the Ocean State.

Where the Gardens Used to Be ~ Farms in Providence's Silver Lake Neighborhood

  In the Western part of Providence, on Plainfield Street and on Webster Avenue, two early 19th century farmhouses have survived, at least until the 1980s according to Providence, A Citywide Survey of Historic Resources. The Alverson farm house at 569 Plainfield Street, stands on what was a large farm extending north from Plainfield Street, and the Plain Farm at 108 Webster Avenue extended from Laurel Hill and Terrace Avenues and Hillwood, Whitehall and Plainfield Streets. King Farm was also located in Silver Lake -- the Neutaconkanut Hill Conservancy gives a little background on the King family's land holdings in the neighborhood.

The Silver Lake Neighborhood page in the City of Providence's website describes the area as rural

...with sparse agricultural development throughout the 18th century and much of the 19th century. In 1710, the Plainfield Road was laid from Silver Lake to Plainfield, Connecticut. Soon thereafter, in 1720, the area's first settlers established King Farm. By the end of the century, several more families established farms in the area, primarily along the highway.

While the Silver Lake settlement was part of Providence, its remote location allowed for very little involvement with the city. In fact, by the mid-1700s, a large portion of Silver Lake residents sought to secede from Providence. In 1759, the town of Johnston annexed Silver Lake, thus reinforcing its rural character for well into the next century. In fact, there is a now defunct dairy farm structure still standing on Lowell Avenue near Pocasset Avenue.

I expect there will be more relevant information at next week's presentation on The history of Neutaconkanut Hill and it’s original boundaries on Wednesday, June 22, 2011, at 6:30pm at the Mohr Library in Johnston

FYI, Neutaconkanut Hill is the actual northwest boundary of the original land granted to Roger Williams. 

I'll be doing some library and archival research in the coming weeks once the website is up, but for now I'm gathering preliminary information for this ongoing project that will document agricultural activity in Providence, RI, since its earliest English settlement 375 years ago in 1636. Gardens, farms, and greenhouses that "used to be" and that currently exist can be listed in a new website that I'm building. Providential Gardener is adding a brief description about a farm or garden with historical roots weekly here until the website is ready for prime time.

Do you know of an historical garden in Providence that should be included? Do you know of sources of information or photos and maps that depict agricultural land in Providence in years past? Please let me know at skorte@providentialgardener.com.

Where the Gardens Used to Be ~ Gardening in Providence, RI

"Where the Gardens Used to Be" is a new Providential Gardener project that documents agriculture in the City of Providence, RI, from the earliest times to the present. Any garden, farm, or greenhouse that has been or currently exists in the original territory that was the Providence Plantation, established in 1636, can be listed.

I'm creating a website that will display the collection of gardens, but meanwhile, anyone with information about historical gardens and farms in Providence can email details to The Providential Gardener for inclusion. This is part of Providence's 375th celebration that will go on for the remainder of 2011.

The Roger Williams National Memorial at North Main and Smith Streets has demonstration gardens that show native American farming techniques ...

...and the plants usually found in colonial kitchen gardens.

Urban Agriculture ~ Providence Continues to Grow!

YERT (Your Environmental Road Trip) videos document the travels of 4 young people during 2007-2008 who interviewed people in all 50 states about environmental issues. The Rhode Island video featuring Rich Peterson of City Farm is just the thing to see before the big Spring Kickoff for Plant Providence on Saturday, March 20, at the The Highlander Charter School, 42 Lexington Ave, Providence, RI, from 1 to 4pm. There'll be info on planning gardens, starting seeds, and composting, plus soil testing. Bring seeds for a Seed Swap, sample the ethnic food prepared by Providence's gardeners, and learn to make Nime Chow. 

The Kickoff is the first in a series of about a dozen workshops from now going into the fall on gardening in Providence. See the Plant Providence website for the full listing. And don't forget that you'll find all of these events in a nice neat Calendar format at What Grows On in Rhode Island.

 

This is YERTpod5. The YERT team also visited Watson Farm in Jamestown and interviewed Rhody Fresh dairy farmers and an alpaca farmer (YERTpod6). The YERT website has lots of other interesting and entertaining videos. What are your favorites? I was especially intrigued by the perennial vegetables and grains described in YERTpod30, Perennial Good Food In Kansas.

On Being Outdoors in Winter

Yesterday, January 20, 2009, more than two million people spent the day in 20-degree weather and lived to tell the tale ~ and what a tale! What a day! What a sight, to see about twice the population of the state of Rhode Island standing on or near the National Mall during the inauguration of President Obama. No one minded, or at least, folks put the cold out of mind and let their hearts and bodies be warmed by the day's events. Did anyone get frostbite? Aren't they glad they were there? Isn't the memory of that day and their presence in Washington, DC, worth standing for hours in the cold? Two million people would say yes.

So what are we doing inside TODAY? It may even be a bit warmer than yesterday in DC. Are you going for a walk? I'm reluctant to get out there when it's so icy on the city sidewalks, but the roads in the parks are clear and not too distant. Why don't I just go over to Roger Willliams Park and take a walk? There are 10 miles of roads there. North Burial Ground is a Providence Parks Department responsibility and it's closer to me. I can walk there, and it also has 10 miles of roads within it. Cemeteries often have cleared their roads of snow and are beautiful places to walk. I went over to Swan Point Cemetery today. Yes, indeedy, it was cold, and the whole time I was there the sun was behind clouds. But it was beautiful and quiet, just a few walkers including a man with a hawk on his arm. By the way, THANK YOU to all my wonderful neighbors who help me shovel the snow and who shovel their own walks! Way to Go!

With all this snow there's sledding! We have lots more snow today than when I took the top photo of sledders in Roger Williams Park last week, so it could be even more fun than these folks were having. Make your own memories and have a great time! There's cross-country skiing, there's ice skating if the ponds freeze hard enough. RI DEM provides ice safety information for Lincoln Woods, Goddard and Meshanticut State Parks on its 24-hour Ice Information telephone line, 222-2632. They advise us to contact local recreation departments for skating opportunities and conditions in individual communities since DEM does not monitor ice conditions in local communities.

If you do want an invitation to the outdoors, though, check the Outdoors Calendar on my unfinished redesign of What Grows On in Rhode Island. I have been working on a reorganization of the information in The Providential Gardener and What Grows On in Rhode Island to make them more useful, but there's still a lot to do. It's keeping me from writing posts for the Providential Gardener. Other Rhode Islanders are writing on other blogs, though. You can see their work in news feeds from various local and national environmental groups.... This aggregated set of feeds is incomplete, to say the least, but It's a taste of what's to come on What Grows On in Rhode Island.

Outdoors, Nature

Trees 2020 Initiative ~ Training Date September 24, 2008

Please pass the word, those of you who live and/or work in Providence

Trees 2020 is a new tree planting initiative that aims to initiate the planting of 40,000 trees in Providence by the year 2020 to improve our environment.  Our tree purchase program offers trees at a sharp discount to Providence property owners to encourage them to plant a tree in their own yards.  A training date for volunteers with or without tree knowledge is planned for Wednesday, September 24, 2008 at 5pm. See below for brief invitation or the flyer and signup form.

From Doug Still, Providence City Forester:

Come be a part of the Tree Team!  Volunteers are needed for Trees 2020, a new program to increase tree cover and improve the environment in Providence by encouraging homeowners and property owners to plant trees.  Whether or not you have experience with trees, we need you!  To learn more and get involved, please read the attached flyer.

TRAINING DATE for Site Assessment volunteers:

When:     Wednesday, September 24, 2008 from 5:00 - 6:30 pm.
Where:    Chamber of Commerce auditorium, 30 Exchange Terrace (downtown)
Given by:    Doug Still, Providence City Forester

Send us your volunteer signup form, or contact Ray Perrault at 351-6440 x14 or by email.    Our website www.trees2020.org will be on-line in late September.

T-Shirts and much appreciation for all volunteers!

This is a joint effort of the City of Providence and Groundwork Providence, funded by the Helen Walker Raleigh Tree Care Trust and the Rhode Island Foundation.

Lessons from Fields & Streets ~ Reflections on a Scott Turner Commentary

A regular feature on the Saturday Projo Commentary page is Scott Turner's column. He has been writing about nature for Projo for a while now, and I look forward to each column. It's good to see the world through his eyes.

September 6, the theme was "Lessons from field and street," a comparison of how he spent his summers in 1968 and in 2008 ~ the former in the Bronx in that incendiary summer, the latter in tranquil New Hampshire. It is sobering to think of what children in our cities experience ~ and don't experience. If you've seen any of the HBO series, The Wire, or if you drive around parts of Rhode Island's urban landscape, you have some idea of the Bronx in 1968 ~ its bleakness, hopelessness, and death ~ hardly a plant in sight ~ not even weeds. Another recent commentary, "Fragrance, Friendship, and Fast Living," June 21, 2008 also described an event from his childhood ~ how a friend excitedly introduced him to what might as well have been a different planet:

MY BEST FRIEND, Jamie, with the long eyelashes and thick brown hair, led me on a 20-block walk along teeming, tree-less, four-lane Fordham Road in the Bronx. He wouldn’t tell me where we were going, but I trusted Jamie enough to let him surprise me. “You gotta see what I found,” he said.

That late June morning in 1968 was bright and sunny as we slipped our bony, soon-to-be-10-year-old bodies through two bent wrought-iron bars on Southern Boulevard, sneaking into the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG)....

Take a look at Scott's commentaries, especially this one about NYBG and find out how their adventure turned out. You can find very recent ones on Projo through their search function [search on "Scott Turner"], or try Google ~ this search turned up a lot of Turner's columns:

"scott turner" "nature writer"

Providence is indeed fortunate that more than 25 years ago, some folks decided there should be a land trust here that encouraged urban agriculture. Clifford Street in Providence now looks very different from The Wire's streets. I learned recently that the site of City Farm was once a chop shop for processing stolen cars. Now it looks like this:  

Southside Community Land Trust has been running afterschool Youth Garden Club programs at two Providence elementary schools for four years now, in addition to other programs and their hundreds of community garden plots. City Farm has open houses through October on Thursdays around 6pm, and out at Urban Edge Farm in Cranston on Saturday, September 13, 2008, it's the very fun fund raiser for SCLT, the annual hoedown.

The current newsletter describes the Youth Garden Clubs, and the website has the hoedown info, as does What Grows On in Rhode Island ~ Rhode Island's most comprehensive environmental calendar.  SCLT is working on acquiring more land for urban gardens to meet the needs of their long waiting list for plots. For the land and for the garden clubs they can use all the funds they can get. The fields are now surrounded by Providence streets. Kids today, all kids, who are just like Jamie and Scott, ought to grow up in gardens.   

 

Voice Your Views at the Providence Waterfront Charrette

Some day they will complete the I-Way construction project, and India Point Park will be more accessible again. But what will the view be at the waterfront when the dust settles?

Friends of India Point Park urge all interested Providence residents and Rhode Islanders to voice their views at some or all of the waterfront charrette sessions being held at Johnson & Wales University June 9-12, 2008. The sessions are also listed in What Grows On in Rhode Island, the state's most comprehensive environmental calendar. FIPP writes:

Next week's citywide waterfront charette is a crucial chance to speak out about waterfront public space and the future of the city's greatest natural asset. PLEASE COME!

WHEN:    Mon-Thurs, June 9-12, day & evening sessions.

[Final Schedule Waterfront Charrette, June 9-12, 2008]

Most important session: TUES, June 10, 2-4pm on waterfront public use.

Other workshops important for public space issues:
      -- evening sessions, 6-9pm, on consultant's four scenarios for the waterfront
      -- Tues, 11:30-1:30: examples of waterfront mixed uses in other cities
      -- Wed, 2-4: revenues from the waterfront

WHERE:  Johnson & Wales Harborside Campus, 265 Harborside Blvd in Fields Point. [Directions]

WHY:  Broad public support is essential to creating a public Gateway at the head of the Bay.

WHO:  All interested citizens are welcome. Pick & choose sessions you want to attend.

THE VISION:  The Shooters site offers a golden opportunity to create a public destination that will benefit the city and region for generations to come. Its unique advantages include:

• Geographic: the intersection of interstate highways, major bike paths, and riverfront greenways at a deepwater port half a mile from the Jewelry District and downtown Providence.
• Historic: Our city's 300-year maritime tradition can be revitalized with a recreational boating center, in tandem with keeping the working waterfront on Allens Avenue.
• Economic: A Bay-front destination will encourage tourism and full use of India Point Park for festivals, concerts, and regattas that bring millions of dollars to other mid-size cities.
• Scenic: Sweeping views down the Bay attract visitors and residents, and generate real estate values as far into the city as views of the Bay can be seen.

PUBLIC SUPPORT:  Two indications of broad public support for our vision: 

1 The priorities_charts filled out by participants at the Fox Pt neighborhood charrette, May 8. The item with the most dots reads, "Encourage the development of the former Shooters site for public use."

The two items with the next highest number of dots call for 1) keeping any development of the Brown warehouses next to the Radisson Hotel low enough to preserve water views from I-195, and 2) connecting a pedestrian way from Blackstone Park around India Point to the Providence River.

2 - PROJO ARTICLE excerpt about turnout urging public use of the Shooters site at the charrette, May 7.

News from Providence Neighborhood Planting Program

 A True Environmental Steward Leaves Her Mark

After almost eight years of dedicated service, Jennifer Cole is stepping down from her role as Director of the Providence Neighborhood Planting Program this month and relocating to Virginia.  At a farewell party held in her honor this past Wednesday the 6th, the city awarded Ms Cole three commendations for her work. 

During her time at PNPP, Ms Cole organized the planting of at least 3000 trees, won a RI Tree Council award for community outreach, and worked through personnel changes in both the City Parks Superintendent and the City Forester positions.  Outside of her work at PNPP, Ms Cole has also helped to open the Conservation Law Foundation office where she worked for four years on urban environmental advocacy issues.  In addition, she served for five years as a Mayoral appointed member of the City Planning Commission.  Ms Cole has said that she is very proud of the impact she has had on incoming developers, who now frequently present their landscaping plan first to the City Planning Commission when making development proposals.  Here are her thoughts on leaving; "I’m not sure what I'll be doing next and I can only hope it is as fulfilling and valuable to the community as my time with the PNPP has been.  I am looking forward to a new city and new challenges but I will be leaving pieces of my heart in Providence, kept safe with friends and a legacy of important work.  I will miss the city, and its great potential, dearly."

New Director for PNPP

Stepping in as the new Director of PNPP is Liz Downing.  Downing grew up in Providence and received her BS in Environmental Science and Management from the University of Rhode Island.  She has run her own ecologically friendly garden maintenance, design and installation business for the past 5 years as a means of developing scarce wildlife habitat within the human habitat. Ms Downing is “excited to expand the scale of my work to citywide reforestation, honored to walk in the footsteps of those who created this program and to work alongside the Providence residents who join together to manifest our city’s full potential.”

Contact information:
Providence Neighborhood Planting Program c/o Groundwork Providence, Inc.
8 Third Street
Providence RI 02906
401-351-6440 x13

Vanilla Beans, Learning Landscape, and the Garden Guys

I couldn't resist calling in to the Garden Guys show this morning (January 27, 2008) on WHJJ 920AM because I knew the answer to the last question for listeners: From what plant do we get vanilla? Not only did I know vanilla comes from an orchid, but also I had actually SEEN the Vanilla Orchid plant four days ago right in Providence! It's native to Mexico, actually, but Madagascar is said to be the largest producer. So how can I have seen it here in the city? It's snowing out as I write this.

Well, the short answer is, I was at Roger Williams Park Botanical Center on Wednesday for training I describe below, and there was the vanilla orchid, a vine growing on trees in the orchid display. The Botanical Center opened about a year ago, a tropical oasis in New England, open Tuesday through Sunday, 11-4, for a very nominal fee. You don't need a passport or an airline ticket to get to the tropics this afternoon. Just get in the car and go to the Park. The Botanical Center is across the road from the Mounted Command.

Last year, I finally had the time to take the URI Master Gardener course, which is about 12-14 weeks long and involves a serious volunteer commitment of 50 hours to earn the title, Master Gardener (MG). It's a continuing commitment: each year to maintain "certified active Extension Master Gardener" status, MGs must attend at least 15 hours of continuing education workshops and volunteer at least 20 hours. Many MGs have hundreds and even thousands of volunteer hours. I've heard that the URI MG Association is the largest volunteer organization in the state.

The URI Master Gardeners are part of the Cooperative Extension, with a mission to provide reliable information about all things growing in Rhode Island to the public. One program I volunteered on is the Learning Landscape: a morning of hands-on exploration and discovery classes in grades K-5 at URI (outside, during the spring and early fall) and

now also in February & March at the RWP Botanical Center!

Special rates are available for Providence School Groups!

School groups from Northern RI and greater Providence can more easily participate in the Learning Landscape ~ no long bus trip to South County. Three schools have signed up so far, but if other schools want to take advantage of this program, contact the Learning Landscape Program Coordinator, Cathi Cote. It's such fun for us who lead the groups of children around the various stations, and the children love it.

Marion Gold, who oversees all of URI College of Environment & Life Sciences Outreach Programs, described the new RWPBC Learning Landscape Program recently on Channel 10, WJAR. Volunteering for programs such as this gives many opportunities to learn; and of course, explaining and sharing knowledge with others helps the memory and further deepens one's understanding of the natural world. The photo is from the Learning Landscape training this week ~ Cathi explaining how to show the specimens of animals native to Rhode Island (all of which had died naturally, by the way, and were found in time to preserve them).

The Botanical Center has a culinary area where you can see bananas growing right now, as well as cacao (chocolate), lemon, guava, avocado, Mandarin orange, and fig trees. You'll also find a carnivorous plant bog maintained by the New England Carnivorous Plant Society, which meets at RWPBC every second Saturday at 12:30. AND...

they just posted the schedule for the SPRING GARDENING SCHOOL at RWPBC, which will be Monday afternoons, 2:00   pm to 4:00 pm, April 2nd  through May 21st at the RWP Botanical   Center Mediterranean Room.

You wouldn't believe all that's Growing On in Rhode Island! This is just a little sample of what there is to do and see in Little Rhody.

Which reminds me ~ If you have school-aged children in Rhode Island and love gardening, be sure to get your school involved ASAP in The Children's Garden Network! They aim to help establish gardens at every school in the state. Their website just went live, and there are advantages to registering your child's school garden as soon as you can. See their website for details, and also this post from What Grows On in Rhode Island.

The Providential Gardener is working on a comprehensive online Union Calendar of RI environment-related events called WHAT GROWS ON IN RHODE ISLAND. Any and every organization planning relevant meetings is welcome to add their events to the Calendar. As the Calendar itself grows, it will be easier for folks to find out about opportunities to learn about and tend our wonderful shared Garden aka Rhode Island.