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caption, page 8:
Gathering to Honor Departed
Last week, the Quiet Corner Garden Club, friends, and town officials dedicated the Providence Street Municipal Garden to those gardeners who have passed. Expanded photo array Wed. night on our FB page: Putnam Town Crier & Northeast Ledger. Linda Lemmon photo.
Gardeners
honored
By Linda Lemmon
Town Crier Editor
PUTNAM — “In every season may this garden welcome neighbors and friends, drawing us in, in kindness and gratitude” said Quiet Corner Garden Club President Elaine Turner as the club and town dedicated the Providence Street Municipal Garden, in memoriam for passed club members.
For a long while the garden club took in donations for passed club members and they had nowhere to plant those memorial plants/trees.
“We’d had conversations for four years,” she said. She decided that she’d be the club president who got things done.
She said they wanted to make the wish come true – for a memorial garden honoring club members who had passed.
A committee of 10 got to work on it and Turner spoke with former Economic Development Director Delpha Very. Turner told Very the club would like to redo the “neglected” garden on Providence Street, at the town parking lot there.
Very’s response? “You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear that.”
With town money and some town labor and lots of club labor, plants were chosen and ordered and there was a “planting party” a few months ago – complete with art (a whimsical metal dragonfly around flowers by Dan Durand).
The club is now setting its sights on a long strip of ugly between the South Main Street town parking lot and South Main Street.
Turner said the top considerations in planning any garden is plant selection and maintenance. They chose tough plants that are always showing color in every season. For the Providence Street garden, Turner said, she and current Economic Development Director Carly DeLuca spent “an entire morning” ordering plants.
Mayor Barney Seney spoke at the dedication of the memorial garden, saying, “I (the town) can pay for the plants but without volunteers’ help, it won’t happen.” The town is completely on board with the next project, the South Main Street garden project. He said he’s all about beautification and art for Putnam. “This is what we need,” he said. “Thank you all and I appreciate it.”
In her memorial garden dedication speech, Turner said: “We dedicate the Providence Street Municipal Garden, lovingly designed, planted and maintained by the Quiet Corner Garden Club, to our club members who have passed but live on in our hearts, in the flowers, the trees, the gentle breezes and warming sun.
The garden was dedicated to: Emily Allard, Bunny Baur, Rita Bernier, Margot Cassedy, Robert Choiniere, Theresa “Terry” Desmarais, Amy Driscoll, Rita Etchels, Jean Fairfield, Majel Gee, Ellen Geer, Susan Godfrey, Doris Harper, Lillian Hutengs, Marjorie James, Peg Koerner, Hazel Kosche, Claire LaPorte, Robin Leo, Martha “Martie” MacLaren, Dorothy Matthias, Eleanor Page, John Papini, Dorothy Porter, Mary Roberts, Mary Larson Seney, Nancy Sheldon, Christine Southam, Marjorie Stanton, Jeannette Truman, Margaret Upham, and Fannie Lee Wahatalo.
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