Volunteers help landscape at Waynesborough
By Bonnie Edwards
Published in News on February 27, 2007 1:47 PM
Volunteers from local garden clubs and Seymour Johnson Air Force Base have added a touch of spring yellow to a new area in Waynesborough Historical Village.
The volunteers removed several forsythias Monday from a patch in the parking lot and placed them and others donated by the garden clubs into the ground. The bushes will run along the fence in the front area of the village's 150 acres of land.
The forsythias will look more natural growing freely at the front of the property, project chairman Lois Hicks said. The Goldsboro Council of Garden Clubs is sponsoring the effort.
Mrs. Hicks said the volunteers who work at Waynesborough had to cut back the forsythias because they were growing so tall. Out front, she said, they will be able to grow free.
But moving the forsythias is not all the volunteers have on their agendas.
Plans are being made for oak leaf hydrangea, another flowering shrub, and iris and eleagnus among the trees on the side lawn. Mrs. Hicks said the eleagnus will also go along the bank of a ditch that divides the side lawn and will help hold the ditch bank in place. Montana clematis also will be planted at the gate to the village.
Next fall, the volunteers will return to plant daffodil and spider lily bulbs, she said
Meanwhile, Mrs. Hicks said all of the five garden clubs in the county are helping with the project. Assisting in organizing the effort are Ruth Kemp, Sheryl Griffin, who prepared lunch for the group, Rachel Rawls and Linda McLendon.
And the base is involved, too.
Col. Steven L. Kwast, commander of the 4th Fighter Wing, allowed several of his officers to help the garden club women with the work Monday. Maj. Clinton Cash even brought his wife, Sharon.
"I really appreciate the base coming to help with the project," Mrs. Hicks said. "Col. Kwast has been wonderful sending volunteers."
The Goldsboro Garden Club has another project in the village, a raised herb garden, which will get under way as summer approaches.
Waynesborough President Arnold Leder said the village has been needing the attention it got Monday for a long time, and the garden club volunteers really knew what they were doing.
"We're trying to preserve the ecosystem in its natural state," he said.
Maintaining the property is important so it can continue to be a draw for the community, Leder added.
"People come here just to walk their dogs on the hiking trial," he said. "Wayne Community College comes out. This place has tremendous potential."