Publication Date: Friday, February 18, 2005
A grand entrance
A grand entrance
(February 18, 2005) Gamble Garden gets a make-over
by Jamie Schuman
The Elizabeth F. Gamble Garden's front yard used to consist of neglected ivy, oak leaves and patches of grass.
Now the entrance better befits the center's name.
Area Rotary clubs donated money and manpower to put the "garden" in Gamble Garden's front lawn. Because of this recent re-landscaping, the entrance soon will bloom with flowers. Gamble staff hope this work not only will beautify the center's front yard, but also will raise awareness of its offerings and provide a platform for new educational programming.
"You used to drive by and you had no idea we were here," Gamble Garden executive director Ken Johnson said. "Now Gamble Garden has an entrance."
Gamble gardeners and local Rotary members spent two Saturdays this month cleaning the entrance and planting about 400 seedlings. In the coming months, the center's gardeners will plant 1,000 native bulbs and wildflowers. The result: a bed of purple, yellow and orange flowers will greet visitors when they arrive.
Gamble Garden is a not-for-profit, public garden complex that relies entirely on donations to maintain its services. Visitors to the center can explore its many gardens, use the library, take courses and rent the facilities for celebrations.
With all of these activities occurring inside Gamble's gates, staff have long wanted to beautify the center's entrance to raise awareness of its presence. The new plot -- a triangle with legs of about 20 feet each -- sits on the corner of Waverley Street and Embarcadero Road. As this space is next to the parking lot and opens out into the rest of the facilities, Johnson calls it the "front door" the center never had, but desperately needed.
Gamble's board of directors and city officials have discussed re-landscaping the plot for about five years, but talks moved slowly due to lack of funds.
The donations of area Rotary clubs turned these wishes into a reality.
Rotary International, a humanitarian organization with 31,000 branches in more than 160 countries, is requiring all of its branches to conduct a large service project as part of its centennial celebrations.
Johnson, a member of the Palo Alto/University Rotary Club, suggested the Gamble landscaping project, and other club members liked the idea. The Palo Alto/University Rotary Club teamed up with the Palo Alto and East Palo Alto Bayshore branches to fund the project and provide much of the man-power.
"There's a lot of cross-pollination between groups," said Don MacKenzie, assistant district governor for area Rotary clubs.
MacKenzie said the clubs were drawn to the project because members could donate more than just funds.
"Rotary doesn't like to just throw money at something," he said. "We like to get our hands dirty."
MacKenzie also doesn't mind getting his clothes dirty, as he spent part of one of his volunteer days lying on the ground, digging a large hole in the soil.
In addition to planting and cleaning up, volunteers installed a handicapped-accessible mulch pathway that will be a prime way for visitors to view the flowers up close.
Gamble staff decided to fill the garden mainly with plants native to western California.
"It's going to kind of replicate what you would see if you were walking up in the hills, without the rattlesnakes and mountain lions," said Merrill Jensen, Gamble's director of horticulture.
Plants include Pacific Coast hybrid iris, salvia and romneya.
Visitors might recognize romneya-- yellow and white plants that Jensen compared to fried eggs -- because they dot the side of many area freeways.
"This will allow people to look at them at a leisurely pace instead of flying by them on 280," said Jensen, who first got interested in horticulture when his grandmother gave him a plant for his seventh birthday.
The garden also features a small tree, a Catalina ironwood, that is native to the Channel Islands. This tree lines many streets in Carmel and thrives in the Bay Area climate.
According to Johnson, this garden will be used as a teaching tool for some of the courses Gamble Garden Center offers to the public. To promote low-water use gardening, instructors can point to those plants that require little water -- and to the front area's new irrigation system that minimizes water use.
City officials are confident that this project will enhance Gamble Garden's presence in the community.
"Gamble Garden and Rotary today are helping take care of city interests and community interests," former Palo Alto mayor Bern Beecham said over a shovel while volunteering.
The city actually owns the Gamble property but leases most of the land to the center for $1 per year.
Beecham, a Palo Alto Rotary Club member, spent an afternoon cleaning a path from dirt that had accumulated there during the planting.
"As part of my normal role, I'm cleaning up after others," he quipped.
Those involved in the project, though, are confident that all of this work will yield good results.
The seedlings already are a great improvement over the oak leaves and ivy. Different flowers will bloom throughout the year, but visitors will have to wait to see the donation's full effect, as the wildflowers and bulbs are not yet in the ground. Jensen thinks the garden will really shine next spring.
"April 2006 will be really pretty," he said.
Editorial intern Jamie Schuman can be reached at jschuman@paweekly.com.
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