An age of rapid technological development brings with it a mushrooming of 'celebrity worship phenomena' ....across the media, in sport and music and in almost all spheres of life. The gardening world's no exception and the 'horticulture show' appears to have its ever increasing number of queueing stars. I prefer gardeners who just love gardening, those passionate, knowledgeable and gifted enough to share their enthusiasm genuinely and generously, without over doing the tedious self promotion stuff like trying to sell you their latest 'personality brand name seeds' or 'green gadget' on screen, while they 'weed', 'dig', 'water' or 'pot on' for a few minutes of their day! Where there's soil there's money!
My own horticultural learning happened through working, (and being), in gardens of many different kinds, in various places, over many years. (If you'd like to know more, please take a look at my blog page on 'Loved Gardens'). I'm very lucky to have had these experiences throughout my life. Such practical, fun and invaluable experiences have more often than not, been supplemented and gently guided by the individual lives and working practices of others. These include those gardeners, well known, (and as you'll see from the list at the bottom of the page), some lesser well known. It must have been my destiny to be some sort of hybrid in the garden?
I grew up in a strong working class community, a thriving north east industrial coastal town. The town formed in 1848 as a settlement for a new railway, harbour and docks which had opened in 1847. A few years later, railway links expanded, connecting my home town to Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool. Timber trading with the Baltic countries was a hugely important industry, (mainly for pit props in the County Durham colliery mines a few miles north), but also for providing resources for the town's shipbuilding. This included repairs, mast making and construction, also beneficiaries of timber imports and Baltic connections, as the population of the town grew.
It was in this thriving, industrial environment that, as a boy, I'd enjoy lots of free time every summer and at weekends. The time offered countless opportunities to explore my surroundings. Especially my strong interest in nature and the natural world, discovering habitats of all sorts creatures, how living things actually functioned and how everything was inter-connected. I climbed, (and occasionally fell from), plenty of trees, as they always seem to beckon. I was fascinated by their different structures, bud and leaf forms and of course those blissful moments, standing under their sheltering canopies during summer showers. I remember playing lots of games in the nearby war memorial gardens and noticing, from an early age, the effects of seasonal change on the flower beds, trees and shrubs. One vivid memory is of the thousands of the brightest multi-coloured wallflowers and their unforgettable scenting of the air of following the spring showers, on my way to and from school. Happy memories too of endless summer hours, paddling and swimming in the often bitterly cold North Sea and playing in rock pools filled with beautiful life-forms, of every colour imaginable, scattered along the shorelines of our local blackened, sea-coal local beaches. I discovered, (and learned), so much about the variety of flora and fauna which inhabited the local municipal parks too! Plants of all kinds always drew my attention as a boy. I'd notice the different forms and 'botanical attributes' of an assortment of weeds, grasses & wild flowers growing through pavement cracks, on back street roof tops, house demolition sites and out of crumbling walls. Rosebay Willowherb was one of my favourite 'weeds' as a boy. It was amongst all these experiences that I lived with my family in a small flat above a pub on a busy road right in the centre of town. A busy warehouse operated from one side of home. A huge gated timber sawmill was built on the other side. When the sawmill closed, this became a dis-used milk cart depot...later becoming an 'adventure playground' for my younger brothers & me. We actually lived just down the main street from a famous brewery, which supplied us with huge hogsheads of 'real' beer every week for our customers, workers from the local shipyards & steelworks as well as our neighbours and friends in the local community. During my childhood years, the morning air was unmistakably scented with toasted barley, malt and hops from the brewery. My parents were licensees. Not having a garden as a child didn't seem to bother me at all, as I always enjoyed a lot of freedom to explore and learn through my childhood adventures in the local surroundings.
I do remember regular visits to my grandparents home about 10 miles away, in a much greener town. Then, a town & civil parish of County Durham. The chemical industry based there, began in the early 1900s. During the war years, explosives were in high demand. In the 1960s, a major industry based on the outskirts of the town began to manufacture plastics. Aldous Huxley visited several industrial sites. It's believed by many that his visit provided inspiration to writing Brave New World!
As a boy, I remember the industrial sounds, sights & smells of the local industries, especially the summer skies at dusk. Another strong memory is that of tree lined roads of post war houses with lots of gardens back and front. A completely different place to my home town. Here, there were acres of fields and green space, far away, (or so it seemed), from the smoky industrial town of my birth. Sunny, summer holiday afternoons spent helping my grandad after he retired, (as a 'fitter' in the shipyards and mentor-trainer to his many apprentices), in his small vegetable garden, filled with carefully tended cabbages, spuds, carrots and parsnip. Running the length of his veg plot, a single line of thriving blackcurrant bushes with their shiny globular fruits. Similarly fond memories of the packed annual summer 'park shows', especially stepping into those huge, warm, sunlit, canvas marquees filled with old trestle tables, covered in rolls of starched white paper, to view with much inquisitiveness, the abundance of home grown fruit, flowers and vegetables, meticulously displayed. I can still smell the fresh produce! I was always ready and waiting for the gardening 'judges' to appear, even though I had to wait outside, peeping through the gap of the canvas of the marquee entrances!
Gardening inspiration in my early years happened also because of a wonderful teacher in junior school. Every Wednesday afternoon, between April and July, our class would be instructed to put down our inky handwriting pens and blotting paper and prepare for the weekly gardening lesson, my favourite time of the week! A small number of old garden tools were hauled from a large cupboard, (along with few pairs of old gloves, hand forks, trowels and a couple of battered old tin watering cans). These would be distributed to the quietest, most 'upright' seated pupil, arms folded, prior to us all being escorted out into the fresh air and huge, silent empty playground. Soil borders around the periphery of the asphalt playground were planted with different sized evergreens, deciduous shrubs and perennials. Every April, the greenest robust shoots would be firing out their new growth and our gardener-teacher would conduct an impromptu fun, spring quiz, where we had to identify or guess what was shooting up from the soil! Each Wednesday afternoon, we'd all be assigned a specific group task, responsible for either a flower bed section, weeding jobs, seed sowing, tidying and tending a large rockery, planting, transplanting, mulching or watering. Those without garden tools (usually the kids who were noisy or hadn't had their arms folded), were instructed to pick up litter or find fallen leaves or dead plants for the compost heap. I always aimed to claim a garden tool! My introduction to the art and science of composting also happened during the weekly lessons, all those years ago. Our teacher loved the school garden! No doubt her love of plants and growing, her know-how and enthusiasm was definitely a catalyst for my own life long interest and passion for gardening.
After my retirement from a far too busy full time career, lots of changes started happening. the most memorable being there was more time available for doing what I love most.....gardening! A few years after retiring, I looked after gardens for friends in neighbouring villages and around the same also began exploring the many health benefits of just being in the garden too. This new interest spurred me on some time later to undertaking training in a number of 'holistic/ complementary' therapies including Reiki, Hypnotherapy, Bach Flower Therapy & Mindfulness Meditation.... a few years later I began working with individuals and small groups therapeutically as a result of my experiences. I began to step into new worlds that I'd not experienced before and ....& my life's direction changed. What a joy!
Around the same period... and because I had the available time, I helped set up gardens in primary schools which were wonderfully rewarding experiences! Young children are naturally inquisitive in a garden setting, being out in the fresh air. It's such a fun way to learn! The children learned to look after, nurture and 'grow their own'. Playing freely and learning from first hand experiences outdoors, they'd become totally absorbed in whatever they were doing, whether it was sowing seeds, planting bulbs or making compost. Simply through the act of digging and holding soil and plants, the children learnt so much, about conservation, garden wild life and eco-systems and most importantly, working with others and valuing respect for all life. Maybe much more so than they are permitted do at the present time sitting still in stuffy classrooms, gazing at the dominating presence of the overactive whiteboard and computer screen? Every primary school should have its own garden!
When working in some of my gardens now, I'm lucky to have the occasional company of my youngest granddaughter, aged eight, who's been gardening with me since her 'toddler' days. She's already a knowledgeable and most enthusiastic gardener!
So, including my dearest memories of being in the garden with my grandfather as a boy.....and that fondly remembered junior school teacher, I'd like now to share and introduce some of my most admired gardeners!
Huge thanks to each of them for helping me deepen my understanding of 'things horticultural' by learning more about the importance of the garden & gardening in their own lives. I'll add another blog page soon to share a little more detail about the life and work of these outstanding gardeners. They are, in no particular order......
Gertrude Jekyll, Vita-Sackville West, Harold Nicholson, Dr. Edward Bach, Percy Thrower, Fred Loads, Carol Klein, George Harrison, Elaine Perry, Claude Monet, Walt Whitman, J.G. Shipley, (grandad), William Shakespeare, Geoff Hamilton, Geoffrey Smith, Thich Nhat Hahn, Juliet Harmer, John Gerard, David Austen, Matthew Wood, Dr. Alfred Vogel, Lawrence Hills, Nickolas Culpeper, William Morris, John Harrison and Charles Dowding.
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