Growing Forward C E L E B R a T I N G 5 0 Y E a R S Friends of Birmingham Botanical Gardens
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The JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2015 bbgardens.org Spencer Lecture presents Dan Hinkley | page 7 Annual Members Celebration | Page 8 1963 2013 years0 looking back 5 Adult Classes | Page 5 growing forward C ELEBRATING 5 0 YEARS FRIENDS OF BIRMINGHAM BOTANICAL GARDENS 2015 BOARD of DIRECTORS Brian Barr ������������������������������������������������President There is always Beverley Hoyt ��������������������������������President-Elect Hanson Slaughter �����������������������������Past President something blooming Scott Walton ���������������������������������������������Treasurer Paul Jones ������������������������������������������������ Secretary at Birmingham Beverley Hoyt �������������������������������VP Development Elizabeth Broughton �������� VP Gardens & Buildings Botanical Gardens. Charles Goodrich ����������������������Governance Chair Wally Evans ������������������������������������������������� Officer Plan your next visit Houston Gillespy......................................... Officer At Large: soon! Cathy Adams Craig Beatty Visit bbgardens.org & Mary Boehm Chris Boles check out what’s new Emily Bowron Maggie Brooke at The Gardens. Clarke Gillespy John Hudson John Hurst Turner Inscoe Bill Ireland Elizabeth Jernigan Natalie Kelly Carl Jones Katy Baker Lasker John Miller John Smith T January Amanda Foshee, Junior Board President Camellias OUR MISSION Hollies Friends of Birmingham Botanical Gardens promotes public knowledge of plants, gardens & the environment; & Orchids receives, raises & administers resources for these purposes. OUR VISION Pansies The vision of Birmingham Botanical Gardens is to be one of the nation’s preeminent botanical gardens. Tea Olives Winter Annuals STAff Winter Hazels MAIN ....................................................... 205.414.3950 Fred Spicer ........................................ Executive Director & CEO Winter Honeysuckles Stephanie Banks ............................................Director of Finance Dawn Coleman .......................... Education Activities Specialist Wintersweets Ragan Cox Stone ..............................Special Events Coordinator Elizabeth Drewry .............................................................Librarian Ellen Hardy ........................... Education Program Coordinator Blake Ells.................................... Public Relations Coordinator Jean Frey ............................................. Director of Development Henry Hughes .........................................Director of Education Jason Kirby ....................................Library Assistant & Archivist Andrew B. Krebbs .......... Director of Marketing & Membership Hope Long ......................................Director of Library Services February John Manion ...........................Kaul Wildflower Garden Curator Pam McLeod ..................................Donor Services Coordinator Asian Magnolias Brooke McMinn.............. Plant Adventures Program Specialist Drew Rickel .........................................Donor Relations Officer Taylor Steele ............................................Volunteer Coordinator Camellias Rona Walters ...............................................Membership Assistant Fringe Flowers ON THE CovER The Garden Dirt is the newsletter of Friends of Birmingham Botanical Servis1st Bank presented the Dirt Dash 5K Fun Run/ Gardens. The Garden Dirt is published six times a year Lenten Roses to foster awareness & support events, services, & significant programs Family Walk at Birmingham Botanical Gardens on of Friends of Birmingham Botanical Gardens. We welcome Mahonias Saturday, November 15. More than 225 runners and your comments & address corrections. Please contact: casual walkers ran the scenic trails of Alabama’s most Friends of Birmingham Botanical Gardens Pansies Editor, Andrew B. Krebbs, director of marketing & membership visited free attraction while supporting its educational 2612 Lane Park Road Birmingham, AL 35223 Quinces mission. Funds raised benefit educational programs at 205.414.3959 or [email protected] The Gardens including its flagship, Discovery Field bbgardens.org Winter Annuals Trips, which has provided a free, curriculum-based Friends of Birmingham Botanical Gardens practices a policy of equal opportunity & equal access to services for all persons regardless of race, science education to nearly 100,000 Birmingham creed, color, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, orientation or sex. Birmingham Botanical Gardens is a facility of Birmingham Park & children over the last decade. Recreation Board. The deadline for the Mar/Apr issue is January 15. W Dear Friends, OUR GARDENS, Happy New Year! After a full year of YOUR GARDENS celebrating our 50th year in partnership with the City Message from EL of Birmingham, all of us here are looking forward to Brian Barr, Board President kicking off our second half-century. As 2015 unfolds, please stay tuned to the Garden Dirt and watch your Just over 50 years ago local com email’s inbox for the Dirt E-lert for...well...all the dirt community leaders had a vision for on what’s happening. Birmingham Botanical Gardens. I’m glad they did. It started fairly Change is coming to the Garden Center as simple – there were to be sectors of part of the city’s recent bond referendum. We expect the 67 acres dedicated to different work to begin in late February or early March on plant families and other features, all accessible by automobile! renovations to eight restrooms, a full makeover for E Many of the originally planned gardens and features still exist: the Strange Auditorium, and improvements to the The Fern Glade, Rose Gardens, native flora, the Japanese Ireland Room, truly the workhorses of our facility. Gardens and, of course, the recently renovated Conservatory. While making these areas much more attractive was A lecture hall was proposed, and we have several locations that a major goal, sustainable materials and technologies are used for this purpose and other events and programs. It (including bamboo flooring and LED lighting) are is safe to say that things have changed a great deal, though woven throughout and much of the work is related to thankfully much is still the same. universal access for all of our guests. One item that is unquestionably the same is our If you’ve visited in the last year, you know mission. Our mission then, as it is now, is simply to educate change is also afoot outside our gates. Long-term people about plants, gardens, and the environment. And work across Lane Park Road is continuing and we’ll fortunately for the many that share interest in this mission, we have a new, elegant neighbor, the Grand Bohemian have one of the most beautiful places in Alabama to stage our Hotel, opening up across the street later in the year. show. Our accomplishments to this end are something about The Cahaba Road work should be completed in late which you should be very proud. Last year we had over 350,000 winter. We envision both projects as positives for our visitors and every single one of them visited for free. Our five area and opportunities to improve pedestrian access miles of paths and trails were open 365 days. These paths and to The Gardens. You’ll also see internal improvements trails offer access to over 30 gardens in both naturalistic and to enhance that connectivity, which ties in line to the interpretative styles. These gardens coupled with our indoor long-term vision of the Red Rock Ridge & Valley facilities provided educational opportunities for over 15,000 Trail system. school-age children. In today’s age of iPhones and Xbox, I Finally, I’ll add a word of personal thanks to believe you’ll agree this is a good thing. our outgoing and incoming board members. While But this isn’t all. We’re quite serious about our often working quietly behind the scenes, our skilled, mission. Through our Plant Adventures programs we provided strategically-minded and all-volunteer board has appropriately-adapted botanical education to over a thousand provided me with unwavering support that has had participants from Children’s Hospital, United Cerebral Palsy a visible (and, to me, visceral) impact. As I begin my and many other Birmingham community organizations that fourteenth year here – and those years have simply help people with special situations. This program is housed in flown by – my appreciation and respect for all who its very own learning area near our library, which by the way is have served has only deepened. the only public horticulture library in the USA. Just upstairs from the library we maintain our plant information center and regional horticulture hotline, all staffed by the Alabama See you in The Gardens, Cooperative Education System and by Master Gardeners. Got a question? Call, email or stop by. We’ve got a great thing going at your Gardens. I invite you to learn more. We have terrific events all year long, many Fred Spicer ways to educate yourself, help educate others, volunteer for this Executive Director & CEO or that…all of which are great ways to learn more. The best way, though, is just to be here. Please come take a stroll and you’ll see just what I mean. 1 A LEGACY OF GIVING AND ENT GENEROSITY Jean Frey, development director M Fall transforms Birmingham Botanical Gardens into a rich P palette of colors, and for Dr. John Durr Elmore, who walked frequently in The Gardens, it was his favorite season to enjoy long walks among O the vibrant foliage. Even when his walks became more difficult over the years, Dr. Elmore would bring friends