Nemont Manor Grows Community With Garden

As a number of residents at Nemont Manor looked out on their long-standing garden plot on the west side of the building, they started thinking about what a garden might look like. Residents Rhonda James, Elsie Capdeville, Harold Lindell, Castor Simensen and Gene Goldberg, decided to grow the garden both in size and in plants.

According to Nemont Manor's Office Assistant Terri Long, in recent years a few residents would grow potatoes, corn and tomatoes but no where near its current size. Long described the present garden saying, "This year it took on a life of its own."

While discussing how the garden came to grow in such a way, James and Capdeville described a situation in which a few people took on small parts in a bigger plan that eventually produced the new garden. "A lot of people just started noticing things needed done," said Capdeville, adding while proudly holding up her thumb saying, "It took the green thumb."

The gardeners gave much of the physical labor credit to Seth Morehouse, the maintenance and grounds keeper at the manor. James and Capdeville credited him with tilling the land and installing a deer-deterring electric fence. The garden is currently growing varieties of vegetables, herbs and flowers throughout a garden that spans at least a few hundred feet.

James and Capdeville described the growth of the garden as being really organic from the community. "As we would work people would ask if we could plant this or that," said James, adding, "And if we didn't have it they would go buy some and we would plant it."

Presently, the plan for the harvest is to share it with the community, as James put it, "There will be enough for everybody."