A Touch Of Green
Food park adds touch of green near interstate
by Natalia Mielczarek
Tennessean 7/24/08
With a towel around his neck to wipe the sweat. Sizwe Herring directed traffic on two acres of land Saturday morning.
He asked two boys to work on the composting pile in one corner of the George W. Carver Food Park at the intersection of Gale and Lealand lanes. Then, he walked the grounds to check the on the ripening tomatoes, peppers and okra. One minute he tended to the rose garden. The next, he admired a peach tree he called his "pride and joy."
It's clear Herring is into green living. His passion has helped convert a sliver of state property bordering Interstate I-440 into a thriving community garden and its growers into believers.
The gardeners take some of the vegetables and herbs home but share the bulk of it with Nashville's needy. They celebrated the park namesake's birthday Saturday with a potluck. George Washington Carver was known for teaching former slaves how to farm.
"We've got to realize that our energy resources are finites, they're not infinite," Herring said. "It's about getting people outside, away from the video games and computers, and getting reconnected with nature.
"It's about a lot more than growing vegetables. It's about relationships and sustainability."
Though the garden is on state property, a permit for use hasn't been signed, said Julie Oaks, spokeswoman for the Tennessee Department of Transportation. "However this operation is not interfering with our operation or maintenance of the right of way," she said.
The food park, supported by grants and donations was started in 1991 and has developed into a place where more than two dozen kinds of vegetables are grown and life lessons are learned nearly every Saturday.
One of the teachers is Johnny Ewing, Jr. 92, who has been a regular at the garden for eight years. He walked the grounds Saturday with a cane while dispensing wisdom.
"I've been coming because I'm going back to this stuff; it's dirt. From earth we come to earth we go," he said. "My mama told me, 'If you don't help someone, no one will help you,' so I come here."
In addition to their individual plots, the gardeners grow community plots to benefit area food banks and other charities. They maintain a huge composting site that collects leaves from across the city.
Herring wants to teach Nashvillians that one man's trash is his treasure. "Leaves are not trash; talk about going green," he said laughing. "The recipe for compost is brown plus green equals gold."
