Birth Of The Garden Centre

Garden centers seem to be as inevitable as gardening itself. There are active and useful centers in most sections of the United States. Rather famous ones are located in such cities as Cleveland, Chicago, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Wheeling, Detroit and Fort Worth. Other busy industrial centers are becoming so garden-minded that garden centers are bound to develop. Even New York, blasé and money-minded, is in the throes of a movement, which, it is hoped, will culminate in a real garden center where a full-time horticultural expert will be employed.

Victory Gardening has had much to do with the development of this garden center idea. Interest in gardening was greatly stimulated by the war, but even before the war, garden centers were cropping up like mushrooms, some of them to wither just as fast. Yet it is good to note that many are alive and flourishing today. Tucked away in the green hills of western Massachusetts is the Berkshire Garden Center, a unique institution in the world of gardening. Servicing a largely rural area, composed of a number of scattered communities, this center offers a service so worthwhile that its fame has spread far and wide. In fact, it enjoys the membership and support of gardeners and organizations that are not even in the state of Massachusetts.

The director, A. Kenneth Simpson, a youngish man in mind and spirit, has been in charge since the group was first organized in November, 1934. He has watched and helped the Berkshire Garden Center grow from a humble beginning to a live and substantial institution. Naturally, garden centers do not just happen. Someone starts them and keeps them going. The idea for this one originated in the mind of Mrs. Bernhard Hoffman, who gave the land and buildings, and was sponsored by the Lenox Garden Club, of which Mrs. Carl A. deGersdorf was then president. “It is proposed to start a Garden Center in Berkshire County,” read the modest appeal of the first notice that was sent out, and which was signed by six nearby garden clubs—Lenox, Richmond and Northern Berkshire, Richmond Valley, Great Barrington, Pittsfield, and Alford.

Other founder organizations included the Lenox Horticultural Society, the Stockbridge Grange, Stockbridge Library, and The Garden Club Federation of Massachusetts. Those familiar with this region are aware that it has long been a popular summering place for families of wealth and social position, as well as for writers, artists and musicians. The Berkshires have long attracted an interesting group of people. A background of gardening tradition in the region also, undoubtedly, helped in starting a garden center movement, and there have been a few generous gifts of equipment and money.

By: davidbunch

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