Tucked behind a downtown Lebanon playing field, the Canillas Community Garden is a bustling hub for longtime residents as well as Lebanon’s growing international community. The garden’s visionary founders are preparing to celebrate 10 years of success in ‘sowing the seeds’ for how to cultivate healthy soil, grow organic vegetables, and share wisdom and knowledge with the next generation of gardeners.

Pat McGovern, Helen Brody, Polly Gould, and Cherry Angell are the current coordinators of the Canillas Community Garden. Three of the team are founders, and have observed firsthand the evolution of the garden from its modest beginnings with seven raised beds and a spiral garden to an important community gathering place and educational collective with 35 beds and a reputation for innovation and welcoming gardeners of all ages and abilities.

Regular visitors: Jean Howe and her granddaughter, Melanie

According to the National Gardening Association based in Williston, VT, the number of households participating in community gardens in the United States has increased by more than 200% since 2008. The vast majority of new gardeners is comprised of young people in urban areas concerned with food security and healthy eating practices. Attracting younger gardeners is an important consideration for McGovern, who writes the Canillas Community Garden blog. “The organizing committee sees succession planning as a concern. We are taking responsibility for finding the next generation of gardeners.” McGovern points out that a lot of people come into the area for work, check out the garden, then move away after a few years. While many gardeners have been part of the organization since the beginning, roughly 10% of the group moves on each year. McGovern said that even with this natural turnover rate, “We have a waiting list right now and I don’t believe we will be able to meet the need.”

The garden is a shining example of a before and after success story. Located on what was formerly a dump site, early efforts to prepare the soil for the future gardens yielded some unwelcome surprises like rusted metal, glass and pottery shards and leaded soil. These findings led to a raised bed model, which involved trucking in tons of good soil and mulch to establish the beds and pathways rather than digging down into the existing soil. With support from the Carter Community Building Association which owns the land, Mascoma Savings Bank Foundation, Upper Valley HEAL, the Unitarian Church, and many hours of volunteer labor, the garden was born in 2009.

Co-founder Polly Gould points to the reasons she continues to be involved. “I don’t like meetings,” says Polly. “But I saw that there were fun things to do in a group, and I enjoy the social aspects of the garden.” Polly and her husband Frank designed and installed the ‘spiral garden’, which appeals to both children and adults, but in different ways. “Adults don’t have the same sense of how to use the spiral garden as children do. The children weave in and out of the spiral, exploring freely, touching and smelling the flowers,” says Polly.

Volunteers pose in front of the new garden shed

Outreach activities to member gardeners and the greater Lebanon community are one of the primary ways knowledge is shared. From horticultural tips about soil health and cover crops to pest management and ecological concerns like climate change, Pat considers the garden to be a place that promotes all aspects of healthy living. “An issue that is important to me is pesticides,” says Pat. “What being an organic gardener means is educating others about how to grow food safely.” The negative effects of chemicals on children’s cognitive and physical development as well as the disruption of water quality and pollinators are growing national concerns. Pat notes, “Because we are attempting to grow healthy food, we have become a voice for change.”

The Canillas Community Garden’s ‘voice’ extends into mutually beneficial partnerships with local organizations including students from the Regional Resource Center at Hartford High School who helped build a storage shed after a wheelbarrow left outside became a makeshift home for a mother duck and her chicks. Last summer, volunteers began the installation of a Mascoma Greenway pocket park pollinator garden behind Goss Logan Insurance, and two ‘easy access’ raised beds have been funded by the DHMC Aging Resource Center to accommodate gardeners who need a little extra height for planting and harvesting. Last year’s Arbor Day Celebration featured refreshments and the planting of an oak and maple tree in collaboration with the City’s Recreation & Parks Department.

Garden Girls Becky Perkins, Pat McGovern, Polly Gould,
and Helen Brody

Cherry Angell, a long-time volunteer who is at the community garden every day during the season, was brought up with the idea of giving back to the land if you take from the land. Known by many as the “Angel of the Garden”, Cherry spearheaded the new leaf mulching operation, which uses truckloads of leaves collected and delivered by the City, guaranteed not to have been sprayed. “I’ve always gardened – it’s my daily workout, and I love flowers – the irises that bloom in the spiral garden each spring are gorgeous. People bring friends to see what is going on and we give them tours.” Cherry works with gardeners who have surplus vegetables to share the bounty with visitors, which is especially important for children as they learn about how their food is grown. This spring, the children’s garden will become more edible with snow peas and cherry tomatoes, complementing several beds of decorative perennials and annuals.

Author and co-founder Helen Brody, who lives at nearby Emerson Place agrees educating children is vital. “The children’s garden is so important. I have met college students who did not know that carrots were grown in the ground,” says Helen, who is planning to install an edible children’s garden for the 2018 season. As a recipe developer, Helen is fond of sharing her favorite recipes from garden harvests, and believes that the international members of the community garden bring a rich variety of greens and unusual vegetables to the table. Gardeners from Mexico, India, France, Peru, Russia, China, and Korea share their cultural gardening tips, and the diversity is exciting for the native New Englanders working alongside the international members of the garden.

Welcome to our community garden

So what’s new for the spring? Building up the new ‘hugelkultur’ (German term meaning “hill culture”), with organic coffee grounds from the Lebanon Co-op, decomposing logs, brush, and leaves which act like a sponge storing rainwater until it’s needed by the plants. Last year the hugelkultur produced significant yields of winter squash, tomatoes and other crops. The gardeners will also be watching out for bees, wasps, hummingbirds, butterflies, and moths who will visit the new pollinator garden, and education of gardeners new and old will most certainly continue.

As Pat notes, “I see what we do to the land as critical to the health of our planet. We want to focus on soil health, relying on soil/water ecosystems to remove CO2 from the air and sequester it in soil, thereby adding nutrients to the growing plants. In our own small way we can experiment with minimal tillage, using ground covers and mulch, and adding organic matter to absorb water. Regenerating the soil carbon sponge is where the hope is.”

An artistic rendering of Pat McGovern, Helen Brody, and Cherry Angell with garden
flower arrangements

At 65 years young, the Lebanon High School Alumni Association is among the City’s oldest community service organizations. If you’ve been anywhere near Colburn Park in mid-June, you’ve likely come across the association’s multi-faceted and colorful alumni parade weaving through downtown Lebanon, dating back to its founding in 1952.

This alumni float honored classmates who serve in the Armed Forces as well as those who are ‘always in our hearts.’

Like many social and civic organizations around the country, the LHS Alumni Association is eagerly seeking out the next generation of leaders to sustain its community service activities, and finding ways to navigate alumni recruitment in the digital age. With more than 1,400 members on its Facebook page, the LHS Alumni Association is an extensive and active network of Lebanon High School graduates from around the country. Still, the average age of the current leadership is 61, and “It’s time for new blood,” says Association Treasurer Susan McBain ’72.

National volunteering trends suggest that young people are actively volunteering, just not in the traditional ways that their parents did. According to Points of Light President Tracey Hoover, many younger volunteers serve their communities through paid outreach opportunities at work, online crowdfunding for causes they believe in, and by purchasing goods from socially responsible retailers. These trends could mean that community service organizations need to explore unconventional strategies to sustain their good works.

For the LHS Alumni Association, the fun of connecting for the annual parade float contest still holds appeal to the majority of the membership. “The Alumni Parade is flourishing,” says McBain. This year’s theme is “Celebrating 1952”, and there are already seven floats entered ranging from the Class of 1957 to the Class of 2002. Members of the current graduating class and other classes on a five-year rotating schedule spend weeks designing and constructing elaborate floats and costumes. The association holds funds from some graduating class treasury that can in turn be used to build their floats. McBain says it takes roughly 15-20 years for graduates to actively engage in alumni activities because they are busy attending college and starting off in their careers.

The lag time for new graduates to become involved can be a challenge, says McBain, but the association stays in touch with members using social media and email, and sends an annual newsletter by regular mail. Connecting with other area alumni associations to share ideas and compare notes on how to keep their memberships growing also helps the organization stay in touch with potential new members.

Carl Adams 1935

The wide array of educational and school improvement projects the association provides is impressive. The annual golf tournament (in its 8th year) and membership dues support a $4,000 annual scholarship and individual awards of $500 for books. Additional funds are used for projects like shirts for the LHS band, tree plantings, and re-dedication of school gymnasiums to honor long-time Lebanon coaches and teachers Lang Metcalf and Linda Preston. Local members volunteer at sports events and Storrs Hill Ski Area, and support the senior class in getting a truck and trailer for their inaugural Alumni Day float. Association President, Dianne Moody Grant ’69, is concerned about the succession plan for recruiting new members. “We are very dedicated to giving back to the school community, but we’re not sure how much longer we will be able to contribute if younger graduates don’t become involved.”

McBain, who graduated in 1972, says her class is still very active even 45 years after their graduation. “Back then we knew everyone’s parents and maybe even the grandparents. We were all ‘locals’. Many of the students today are from families that are brought to the area by employment, and when the job is done, they move on.” That can’t be said for the oldest active alum, Wayne Follensbee, Class of 1936, who pays an annual visit to Colburn Park on Alumni Day and consistently keeps up with his $10 dues payment!

John Peck on stilts made by Jon Putnam, both class of 1970

It’s also encouraging that the youngest active alumni member is from the Class of 2013. Perhaps this bodes well for the future, and maybe the Class of 2013 can be the first to explore a crowdfunding project to build on the foundation that’s been established by their predecessors. After all, everyone loves a good parade!

The late Nicole Cormen, a dedicated conservationist and Lebanon City Councilor, loved Lebanon’s trails and natural areas. She and her friends liked to hike a different trail every Friday to honor the memory of Laurel Letter, who created Lebanon’s first conservation lands map by hand long before GPS and Google Maps. If you were lucky enough to get out on the trail with Nicole or Laurel, you could be guaranteed to learn a few things about the trees, wildlife, and flowers in Lebanon’s conserved lands.

It’s a bit of a challenge to choose a few favorites from the City’s 22 miles of trails on more than 1,880 acres, with more publicly accessible trails owned and maintained by others to explore. To help me decide, I talked with Ron Bailey, volunteer trail steward extraordinaire, who has designed, built, or maintained nearly every trail in the City’s extensive system. Here are a few options to consider:

Signal Hill

Nicole Cormen with John Joline.

One of my favorite memories of Signal Hill is of a frigid winter night in 2008 when I joined intrepid land stewards Nicole Cormen and Ron Bailey in burning a huge pile of invasive buckthorn on the open summit. The event required permission from the City Administration, the Airport, and the Fire Department, but we made it happen complete with a marshmallow roast. We hiked up the steady incline from Alden Road through two beautiful open fields before turning into the woods for the final ascent. In a just a mile of moderately easy walking, we were greeted with open views of Mt. Ascutney and the surrounding peaks.

On a recent visit, I explored a new trail that loops back down the hill to the meadows past a lovely small pond, with many wildlife tracks to study. Signal Hill’s history is interesting, and it has an historic connection to our brush fire. According to the City’s website, it is “part of the old chain of signal hills and mountains that date back to the Revolutionary War days when signal fires were lit atop the hills to indicate that the Redcoats were coming.”

Farnum Hill Preserve

A jewel in the middle of the City, Farnum Hill is an 880-acre forested tract gifted to the City by Dr. Myric Wood Jr. and family in 1982. As early as 1780, the first meeting house in Lebanon was built along one edge of the preserve, as well as the first road. Later the land was farmed by the Aspenwall and Farnum families. Today, a series of ridge trails with five access points provides hiking, mountain biking, skiing, snowshoeing, and trail running opportunities. The terrain is hilly and steep in places, but my favorite way to explore Farnum Hill is to hike it end to end. You can drop off a bicycle or car at the trailhead 2.4 miles up Poverty Lane, then journey back to the access across Poverty Lane Orchards to begin the roughly 2 hour walk. Shorter loops are available, including the Ron Bailey Trail, and the City’s parks and recreation department hosts the Farnum Five Trail Run here every fall.

Alice Peck Day Hospital Nature Trails

Designed by John Morton, a two-time Olympian and member of the Biathlon Hall of Fame, the APD trail system rolls gently over five miles of woods behind the hospital and neighboring retirement communities, Harvest Hill and The Woodlands. If ever there was a perfect place to cross country ski after a decent snowfall, this is it. The trails are wide enough for skate skiing, and you hardly know you’re ascending the side of a hill as you meander through a series of easy loops with excellent signage and benches strategically located for rest and reflection. For the very adventurous, this system connects with the City’s Starr Hill Natural Area off Young Street, offering additional loop trails. John’s vision of a trail system for everyone to enjoy was enthusiastically supported by the first administrator of the Harvest Hill facility, and is regularly maintained by the hospital. The trails are open to the general public.

Hats off to the trailblazers and stewards like Nicole Cormen and Ron Bailey, who have worked tirelessly along with City officials to create a network of trails and natural areas in Lebanon, most of them permanently protected. These public lands provide for wildlife migration, environmental education, and the simple enjoyment of nature. The next time a Friday rolls around, maybe we should all go for a hike.

The Lebanon Conservation Commission and Planning Department provide oversight and maintenance of the trails and natural areas. Complete descriptions and maps are available on the Planning Department website.

Cindy Heath has hiked nearly all of Lebanon’s trails and all 48 of New Hampshire’s 4,000 footers. She is the former Director of Recreation & Parks in Lebanon.