Summary(0:50) Securing the land from the city -- (2:08) Brooklyn Queens Land Trust's assistance in starting the garden -- (2:51) Close friendship with original garden members -- (4:49) Cleaning the rubbish from the abandoned lot -- (5:38) Building fence, tearing down gazebo -- (6:15) Changes in the garden -- (6:47) Weekly seminars with community residents -- (7:36) Providing plants and food to the neighborhood -- (8:53) Children's vegetable garden -- (10:15) Past neighborhood drug problem -- (12:23) Challenge of recruiting new garden members -- (13:40) Purchasing new soil -- (14:39) Rewards of growing the vegetables and community appreciation.
NoteAudio interview conducted on August 15, 2016, by Samantha Feldman at Ralph Lincoln Service Center Garden. Collected through Our Streets, Our Stories, an oral history project of Brooklyn Public Library. This interview stems from a shared partnership with Brooklyn Public Library and Brooklyn Queens Land Trust under the name of Our Gardens, Our Stories.
SubjectCommunity gardens ; Community development ; Youth development ; Gardening ; Trust for Public Land (U.S.) ; Drug abuse ; Compost--Environmental aspects ; Plants ; Vegetables ; Abandoned buildings
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TitleOral history interview conducted with Robert Matthews on 2016 August 15.