Barbara’s mother enjoyed growing zinnias, like this one at New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill.
By Barbara Meyers
New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill Volunteer
Growing up in the 1960s in then rural Hudson, Mass., around this time of the year, the Burpee Seed Catalog would come in the mail. My mother would be so excited and she would get us kids to gather around the kitchen table with the catalog and start planning her flower garden. We would go through the catalog and pick out flower seed packets and order them. They came in the mail and we would wait for the ground to thaw and then plant the seeds and wait for the flowers.
Barbara and her brother in the garden as children.
My mom always grew the most beautiful gardens. This wouldn’t have been such an unusual occurrence except for the fact that my mother had never planted a garden in her 40 years until she moved to Massachusetts with my father for a job transfer with the Air Force. Or this could have had something to do with the fact that our housing development was built on a former pig farm!
Barbara’s mother’s garden.
Mom was a city girl — born and bred in New York City. I always wondered where she got her knack for gardening and if she passed her love of gardening onto me through her genes. Years later when doing genealogical research for our family tree, I thought I found the answer. I discovered in the 1860 census that her great-grandfather, a German immigrant, was a gardener. On the same census, it listed his father as a gardener as well. Both were born in Windheim, Germany, a small rural village in the German state of Westphalia.
I did further research on German Gardeners in New York City (see book/web links below*) and found that over 20,000 workers, including German Gardeners, built New York City’s Central Park. Due to the fact that the census listed their address as “Shanty” corner of East 78th Street and Avenue A (which is very close to Central Park), I can only hope that my ancestors helped build the magnificent gardens in Central Park. So again I wondered, is the love of gardening something inherited and something learned?
View of Central Park (Image: New York Public Library Digital Gallery)
I continued my Mom’s garden in Hudson after she passed. She had expanded her gardening skills to include vegetable gardening with mixed results but we always ate what she grew that didn’t die. When I retired from my job in finance with the Air Force, I decided to pursue and grow my gardening skills. I started volunteering in New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill’s Education Department setting up the registration pages for the classes. I also started taking New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill’s gardening classes to improve my horticultural skills to include flower arranging.
A few years back, my husband and I went to visit my granddaughter, then seven years old, in New Hampshire. When we arrived, she was standing in the front yard with garden tools in each hand, the same tools that I bought her the previous Christmas (at the New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill gift store!). The first thing she said was “I have been waiting for this my whole life.” At that moment, I hoped that I gave her the love of gardening through this gift. You see, my granddaughter is not blood related, she is my granddaughter through marriage. Again I asked myself, is the love of gardening inherited or learned?
I have finally reached the conclusion that it is both. Gardening skills can be learned but I know that I got the gardening “gene” from my Mom. Please take this precious time that we have been given and pass along your love of gardening to the next generation (either related or not!).
*For further reading about the creation of Central Park, see the book The Park and the People, A History of Central Park by Roy Rosenzweig and Elizabeth Blackmar. Or this link or this one on Central Park History.