Print this pageRose Garden Celebration
50 Years of Blossoming Beauties At Brookdale Park
The rose garden tour had to be cancelled due to the weather, but the four workshops, ‘Beatles Bugs and Blackspot’, ‘Tools of the Trade’, ‘Pruning Primer’, and ‘What’s a weed’ were well received under the tent. The celebration had been planned for several months and the rain could not dampen the spirits of the Master Gardeners.
The Brookdale Park Rose Garden is located at the Grove Street entrance to the park. The Rose Garden was started in June, 1959 with 650 rose bushes including 80 different varieties. But through the 70s and well into the 90s, the Rose Garden was left to languish to the elements.
In 1999, Jonathan Forsell, the Essex County Agricultural Agent, had the vision to begin the restoration of the garden. As a Master Gardener, one is expected to participate in volunteer activities throughout Essex County. Jonathan started a committee to do something with the rose garden. However, due to his bad health, work on the garden waned. The Rose Garden committee started again in ernest in 2003 under the leadership of Bob Kroeckel, the out-going President of the MGEC. Through his relentless leadership, philanthropism, and enthusiasm, he organized the committee once again and the work began.
Planting is not half the story!
Over the years, they planted more than 600 new roses. But, the planting of the roses does not tell half the story of the restoration.
The transformation started with only weed-filled and half dead rose bush beds. There was no budget, no working water system or delivery system, but there were weeds and weeds and weeds. The MGs came prepared to work and work they did!
From the early snow-covered rose beds in March through the hottest days of July and August through the gray windy days of November they worked.They worked the days after the microburst tornado, which littered the park with downed trees; through the paving and the swarming bees and under the watchful eyes of a hawk in the Norway Spruce. They did battle against mugwork, thistle, bindweed, dandelions, chickweed, and swarming carpenter bees, etc. They worked against the disappointment in early spring when they veiwed the destruction of the garden after the winter sledders broke, damaged, and busted the rose bushes.
They worked on Thursday mornings for 3 to 4 hours using their own tools and initiatives. Twenty-three beds were resurrected. The old brick edging were realigned, newspaper were laid down as weed barriers, and covered with mulch. Roses were donated or scavenged from around the town. Discarded wheel barrows were rebuilt by the MGs Grounds Committee. Cast-off tools were collected and brought to the Rose Garden. The dysfunctional water system was jerry-rigged to be usable.
As one can ascertain, the Brookdale Park Rose garden is not the easiest place in which to grow roses. It is very exposed to harsh winter winds, subjected to summer humidity which promote blackspot and rose disease, and subjected to snow sledding in the winter. But this Spring, the Master Gardeners realized that the Rose Garden renovation would be completed by its 50th Anniversary. With the help of Kathy Salisbury, the Essex County Horticulturist. She brought people to mow the lawn between the rose beds, brought in young prisoners on work release who dug up the bottom bed and moved and replanted may of the lower plantings. The County donated some of the new shrubs and trees around the Rose Garden. The County had given the MG mountains of mulch, new benches and the beautiful new arbor.
From no budget to a mighty sum.
From the beginning, the MGs found that the County was unable to provide the financial and equipment support that the MGs expected and needed. The Rose Garden Committee members brought their own lawn mower, weed wacker, hose caddy, fertilizer, herbicides, etc. The costs, at first, were borne by individual MGs, as well as scavenging and restoring old equipment. Over the years, the MGEC has provided a yearly budget to continue the work necessary to enhance the rose garden.
Many roses are lost over the year. The Master Gardeners have bought many new rose bushes. But to stretch the budget, they rescue rose bushes wherever they could. For example, rose bushes were scavenged from the old Marlboro Inn when it was torn down.
Who are the Rose Garden Volunteers
The Master Gardeners of Essex County are a group of dedicated individuals who have trained to become volunteers who provide horticultural programs and services to enhance their communities in Essex County. We, as Master Gardeners, have a commitment to fulfill volunteer hours every year. However, these volunteers are not only gardeners but people who love the parks and want to share in making them the best they can be. They do not volunteer only to rack up hours, but for the love of promoting aesthetic values.
Besides the requirements of being a master gardener, the volunteers do it out of love. For it is only for love that these volunteers work in all weather conditions and donate their time, energy, and money to fulfill their vision of a beautiful Rose Garden in Brookdale Park.
Over the years, the MGs have attracted not only new MGs but other volunteers who want to help and are dedicated to making community parks green and beautiful. Special mention should go to: MGs: Bob Kroeckel, Susan Jankolovitz, Susie Butler, Don Moore, Winston Velez, Pam and Gary Tonucci, and Montclair resident and volunteer, Dave Vericco, for all their hard work and dirty hands and for Florence Rollino, a Master Gardener who printed the plant labels and designed the rose garden brochure.
"We are very pleased that our hard work has brought so much pleasure to those who visit our beloved Brookdale Park," Master Gardener Susan Jankolovits said.
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