Spatial Stories of Sustainability

Olney neighborhood, urban gardener and park volunteer

Laurel is one of the founding members of Fischer Park Community Garden, which was started when she and a group of neighbors involved in cleanups in Fischer Park had the idea to turn a small a patch of the park into a garden in 2002. They enlisted the help of the Fairmount Park Commission to help with the initial building, while Laurel and other neighbors took over the organizing and maintenance moving forward long term. Laurel described how starting the garden was a way to feel more connected to the community and her fellow gardeners. She described; “what I found was what feeds me is seeing a lot of people here, you know, working together, having a good time talking to each other. You know, it's such a positive experience.” Nature for her is a way to bring peace and fun into her life, and she continues to fuel this experience by maintaining the garden and always being the one to bring snacks.

Olney, Northern Liberties, and Philadelphia-wide, Associate Director of Community Education at Pennsylvania Horticulture Society (PHS), urban gardener

I interviewed Sally alongside Laurel, who is a longtime friend and fellow urban gardener who now organizes the Garden Tenders program at Pennsylvania Horticulture Society (PHS), and aids hundreds of urban gardeners citywide. Sally is everywhere at once- and is the self-proclaimed, “stuff person and tool person,” meaning she always finds herself helping others with her truck full of supplies. “Well, I got plants, I got seeds, I got supplies, I pick trash, I always have. I always know where the stuff is” she told me. Sally described how gardens can be as time-consuming as a job because of all the hard work, although the payout tends to be in food instead of a salary. Gardens can be a way of investing in a better future for a neighborhood; “what I realized is that with community gardens, because these people that are pouring their lives into their gardens, for no payment, so as volunteers- if we could get everyone involved in a community garden, they would have to talk to their neighbor, they would have to learn whether there was a language barrier….they would have to learn how to resolve problems on a small scale. So, what we're doing with these community gardening projects, and these greening projects, and these park projects and stuff like that, is we are saving the world one little plot at a time.”

Norris Square, urban gardener and Grupo Motivos founder

Las Parcelas, a collection of garden spaces in the Norris Square neighborhood in Kensington, has been at the cornerstone of the community gardens movement in Philadelphia since the 1990s. Started by a group of women called Grupo Motivos, this garden has continued to grow and expand past its original small plot of land to include multiple gardens and structures. Iris is a legend in the city, having been a co-founder of Grupo Motivos, leader at Norris Square Neighborhood Project, mother and advocate for sharing Puerto Rican culture with all who are interested in learning. Right from the start of our interview, she emphasized how she intented the garden to grow from the seeds of stories and knowledge of her mother, grandmother and all the women from her community back in Puerto Rico. Iris started the garden back in the 90’s, when the neighborhood was facing high rates of crime, incarceration and drug addition. She told me how at first, the priority had to become not about horticulture, but focusing on the needs of the community; “What we wanted to do was to have a clean space where we could gather. We didn't think about trees, not that that was not important at that time. When you are suffering. It doesn't matter when you are hungry. It doesn't matter if we are eating fruits… you are hungry! Who is going to be paying attention to flowers, when you are hurt.” So, she and fellow neighbors started enlisting teenagers to help with cleanup, collecting materials to build benches and art, and cooking Puerto Rican food with coffee to bring people off the streets to gather in a safe, public space. This small project eventually grew to become a Pennsylvania Horticultural Society sponsored community garden, with Iris volunteering on the board, where she had to face being one of the Spanish-speaking women to offer feedback city-wide. For her, the garden has grown to become “my sixth child”, where “it becomes a friendship. Something like a family. And that is such is extremely, extremely important to me, because I come from a community growing up that we were all family.”

Germantown and Philadelphia-wide, Tree Tenders founder and leader at the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (PHS)

When I was first starting out learning about greening projects in the city- there was one name that kept coming up- Mindy. Mindy. Mindy. ‘Everyone knows Mindy!’ Indeed, Mindy, or 'the mother of trees' as some call her, has been working at the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society since the early 90’s, when a side interest in the environment inspired her to create one of the first citizen-led tree-planting programs in the country. Tree Tenders, a program where residents sign up to volunteer and plant street trees in their neighborhoods, was started with the idea to enable community groups with a few resources and a way to organize around tree planting. From 30 people in the first class, Tree Tenders has grown to enroll hundreds of Philadelphia residents and plant thousands of trees each year. For Mindy, trees have always been a way to connect with one’s neighbors and community, and the program has even provided career opportunities for Philadelphia youth to become arborists. Mindy told me “it has helped to change lives. I mean, not everyone's, but it's helped. It gives people a sense of pride to do something like this. And sometimes living in the city you need something to care for, you need something green, and you need to be able to make your community better. So, all we do is- I give it them permission. I don’t know if it's needed, but people sometimes feel like they need it.”

East Falls, tree tenders leader

A resident of East Falls since 1971, Cynthia was one of the first participants of the PHS Tree Tenders program in 1995. When giving me a driving tour of her neighborhood, you could the the difference her work has made in helping East Falls become a green and beautiful place to live. In just one drive, Cynthia pointed out no less than 30 full-grown trees and she and her fellow volunteers have planted over the years; overall the real number is more than 1,100. Currently retired, she is still very active in tree planting, serving on the Tree Tenders committee and applying for grants to fund outdoor adventures and Arbor Day activities for Philadelphia school children. By providing children opportunities to learn hands-on about the natural world, she hopes they find joy and learn how important it is to be stewards of the environment. She told me how rewarding it has been to take her morning walks with her husband, knowing she had helped contribute to the shady streets: “It's being in the neighborhood and on a hot day walking and seeing fellow neighbors including dog walkers and people the strollers enjoying being outdoors.  Even when it's hot, they walk safely because of the shade of the street trees.” She believes although volunteers may face challenges to reach their goals in William Penn's "greene country towne," they should take time to recognize their accomplishments, in order to "feel how the positive always outweighs the negative."

East Falls, tree planting and park maintaince

I met Alice in her home in East Falls, which she has lived in since moving there in 1950 with her husband. She met me on her 96th birthday to share her experiences in maintaining green spaces in the neighborhood. She was one of the first members of Tree Tenders in East Falls and started Arbor Day, a local day celebrating trees in the park with young schoolchildren. She spent many years caring for the small park next to her home, watering the trees, and fundraising for supplies, such as benches. One of her biggest accomplishments was also preserving a small park from being developed as a parking lot by the business district, particularly when she had to stand up in the local council meeting and speak up against a 'very angry businessman'. As hard as it was for her to speak her mind, leading her to “shake all over”, Alice maintains this moment as a point of pride in her fight to keep her community greener and healthier for future generations. When I asked her for any advice she might have, she told me, “Just keep fighting. You’ll win. There's more people that like the green than those who don't like it.”

Strawberry Mansion, urban gardener, block captain

Helen has been an active neighbor, block captain and steward of her beautiful, little block in Strawberry Mansion for 50 years. She’s helped keep the block clean, taken care of vacant lots, fundraised to help neighbors in time of need, and turned one into a beautiful, little pocket park and community garden. “I love people. And it started like that. Anything where I can help be of service,” she told me. The list is endless with Helen’s involvements, all while being a single, working mother of three. When I asked her how she balanced all this, Helen described how she would often involve her children or other neighborhood kids in the various cleanup tasks in exchange for a homecooked meal. She taught her children early on to help out fellow elderly neighbors by cleaning the porch steps, or picking up trash on the street. For others, she would provide tools and supplies, such as gloves and trash bags, and even collect the trash bags herself to help make cleaning the block a community-effort.

Overbrook, tree planter, urban gardener

Maria is also an active tree-planter and gardener in Philadelphia. As I walked up to Maria’s rowhome in Overbrook, I instantly noticed her beautiful front yard, flowers spread in every possible spot, pots overflowing with green on the porch and a street tree providing some shade. Maria wears many hats, including (recently) retired school teacher where she started a gardening club for the children, avid gardener, a community organizer with her neighbors and a Tree Tender in Overbrook. She moved to the United Stated in 1993 from Puerto Rico, what she affectionally calls her ‘first home’. When I asked her what a typical day looked like for her, she described being out the previous day watering, mulching and weeding over 15 trees in a nearby park, almost passing out from the heat. Maria knows all her neighbors and has taken it upon herself to provide plants and resources to anyone who might be interested in adding more greenery to their front yards. She told me that sometimes she has trouble getting places on time because she stops so much while driving; “So when I'm driving around, If I see something that is not quite right, I'm gonna stop because I have tools in my trunk. And I stop and then I start talking to the neighbor. And then I usually I have to tell them where to get the mulch but it's better if I have a piece of paper that they can take a picture of or give it to them.” This includes pruning trees, giving gardening tips and more.