In the Garden
Posted by Jane Metters LaBarbara.July 6th, 2015
Blog post by Stewart Plein, Rare Book Librarian.
Summer is the time when a gardener’s hopes and dreams come to fruition. Sunny days and spring rains combine to bring forth the beauty of buds and blooms in a garden, for as Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “The earth laughs in flowers.” Here are some photos of West Virginians enjoying their gardens.
The only description available for the photo above in the West Virginia History OnView photograph database is “Katherine in her garden.” While we do not know who Katherine was, nor do we know the location of her garden in West Virginia, we do know, from the photo above, that her garden was beautiful and it was cherished by its gardener.
Look closely and follow the path and you can see three people, two women and a man, among the towering flowers in this Martinsburg garden.
Three sisters, Margaret, Gertrude and Calora Hardway, pose behind the daylilies in this Lost Creek garden, 1906.
A women’s 4-H group examines garden plantings in this photo by Ellis Studio in Weston.
Elka and Ernest Hassig pose amongst the dahlias in their Helvetia garden.
Louise Nicholas, above, stands behind a flourishing bed of irises in her Preston County garden, 1963.
Below, Katherine Estenline, former Director of Scott’s Run Methodist Settlement House 1939-1941, poses near a flower bed.
