By Peggy Carroll
It is a gardening program for the younger set and it is called:
Dig It! (Kids love to dig. It’s almost instinctive.)
Plant It! (Kids love to see seeds sprout into green shoots.)
Eat It! (Kids love to eat what grows in gardens. … or maybe not.)
It’s a multi-purpose primer designed to teach youngsters to look at what is growing around them and to introduce them to the importance of green space in their lives and the lives of their community.
And what better place to hold it than in the gardens of the Macculloch Hall Historical Museum, which has been providing green space in Morristown for 216 years.
For four consecutive Saturdays, beginning July 9, 2016, from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., the program will use a combination of fun and fact – and hands-on gardening – to explore a veritable melange of topics – from digging in the earth to digging into history.
It’s all a part, said Museum Executive Director Patricia Pongracz, of the Museum’s current celebration of its gardens and their history in an exhibit entitled Two Centuries of Cultivating Green Space, on view through Sept. 11, 2016.
The program was developed with the conviction that welcoming children to the gardens will encourage them to take part in its cultivation and care and introduce them to the value of exercise, sustainability, history and community. And, of course, healthy eating.
A Garden Classroom
The Museum has prepared three vegetable beds and one pollinator garden, planted with the crops found in the 19th century kitchen garden as recorded by George Macculloch in his meticulously kept garden diary.
It was Macculloch and his wife, Louisa, the first residents of the Hall, who planted the garden in 1810. It has been cultivated continuously ever since.
The garden is home to a wisteria trellised along the rear porch, given to the Macculloch family by Commodore Matthew Perry in 1857; and to “Sassy Lady,” a sassafras tree believed to be the second oldest and the largest of its kind in New Jersey; and to heirloom roses dating from before the 1920s.
One, known only at the “Old Macculloch Hall Rose,” most likely dates to the garden’s earliest days.
In this verdant environment, Pongracz said, the children will learn:
- How Macculloch Hall grew, prepared and stored fruits and vegetables to feed the household throughout the year.
- How to cultivate and care for a kitchen garden
- The positive environmental impact of pollinating insects and birds
- The nutritional and environmental impact of a local garden
- The creative aspect of tending green space – and using it to create art, a lesson led by Linda Howe, a New Jersey artist and storyteller.
- The history of the community, while taking part in it.
They will also tour the Museum’s 19th-century kitchen.
Because the program is supported by a $7,000 grant from the Astle-Alpaugh Family Foundation, Pongracz said, the Museum can offer it to more than 80 children free of charge.
And On Wednesdays…
Dig It! (etcetera) is one of two Museum programs that open the garden to children this month.
The second, Getting Into Green Space, for children ages 5 and up, explores how people, plants and partners in nature make the garden an exciting habitat. Sessions will be held on the four July Wednesdays, from noon to 1 p.m.:
July 6: History Beneath Your Feet: Discovering how archeology provides pieces to the puzzle of the past
July 13: Plant Hunters, Part I : Becoming a 21st century plant hunter while learning about the adventures of the 19th century plant collector David Douglas.
July 20: Plant Hungers, Part 2: Continuing the adventure as modern day plant hunters seeking non-native plant species in the Museum’s garden.
July 27: Becoming Butterflies : Visiting the pollinator garden to search for caterpillars and butterflies.
Of course, not only children are invited to enjoy the gardens. So are adults.
The gardens, Pongracz noted, are open to the public daily, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., free of charge.
For more information on Macculloch Hall gardens and exhibits, call 973-538–2404 or log onto www.maccullochhall.org.