Ten years ago gardeners Olga and Carmen Rodriguez moved back to Puerto Rico entrusting Palmas Del Caribe Community Garden to Alfonso Rodriguez and Julio Medina. The strawberry patch that Olga started in 1972 remains today a permanent fixture of the garden. The garden is located on Eagle Avenue in a fraction of the footprint of the former Hupfels Brewery. The brewery was in operation from the 1860’s to the early twentieth century and was one of many that stood in the area known as Grove Hill. The highest point of the hill was hollowed out as cool caverns where the beer was stored to age. As a result of prohibition in the 1920s the Hupfels family turned the brewery into a mushroom farm. After a number of years the lots began to take on the dimensions that we now see today.  Parts of the brewery were replaced by; housing, a school, a social club, a storage facility, a construction company and the Palmas Del Caribe Community Garden. The original smokestack, a number of old unwieldy retaining walls and a decrepit old warehouse, remains.  “This garden is like our second home”, said Alfonso Rodriguez recently, we come here every week and spend time talking about the old days and sharing news of the neighborhood. We grow vegetables and grapes, celebrate Father’s and Mother’s Days and occasionally we roast a pig for the community. Gardener Ballona , who would like to start a music program at the garden to teach neighborhood youth to play the guitar, often stops by and leads the other gardeners in a sing-along of  Salsa Romantico songs. Salsa Romantico is a soft form of salsa music that emerged between the mid 1980s and early 1990s in New York City and Puerto Rico. Community members stop by and listen as the sweet sounds bring them back to bygone days in the Bronx and Puerto Rico.

harvesting from Carver garden

For the past year the Bronx and Manhattan Land Trust has been honored to work with Peter Shenk Koontz. Peter arrived in NYC from his home-state of Indiana last August and came to BLT and MLT via his Vista sponsored position with the New York City Coalition Against Hunger. He enthusiastically jumped into his role and wore many hats at the Bronx and Manhattan Land Trusts; Blog and Database Developer, Public Relations Guide, IT Expert, Community Organizer, Neighborhood Network Founder, Carpenter, and Urban Gardener. In the year that he served with us his commitment and dedication touched the lives of many Manhattan and Bronx residents. Later this month Peter and his wife Kelly will travel to Afghanistan where they will begin three years of service with Mennonite Central Committee. They will be working with an Adult Education Program and serving as ‘Adult Peacebuilding Education Coaches.’  They will be partnering with an NGO that has been serving Afghans for the last 45 years and is the longest continuously serving, capacity building NGO in Afghanistan. We wish Peter and Kelly success in their future endeavors with MCC and look forward to the day that they return to New York to visit the lifelong friends they’ve made here.

Paula Diaz Harvesting Collards

Now that late summer has rolled around its harvest time for Roberto Clemente Garden. This year’s harvest will include many fruits and vegetables including: tomatoes, eggplants, cucumbers, squash, pumpkins, apples, cherries, pears, figs, peaches, broccoli, lettuce, beans,  sweet and hot peppers, as well as a plethora of herbs. The garden group has doubled its membership and the yield has been tremendous.

Click to view slideshow.

Click to view slideshow.