Fountain and Pumpkins at the Elizabethan Gardens 2010_001

by Greg Reed

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Fountain and Pumpkins at the Elizabethan Gardens 2010_001

Artist

Greg Reed

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Photograph - Photo

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Taken October 2010 at the Elizabethan Gardens, Manteo, NC

Elizabethan Gardens History

In 1941 the Fort Raleigh National Historic Site became an official attraction for Outer Banks visitors, and just 4 years prior, the Lost Colony Outdoor drama opened within the Fort Raleigh grounds. Within years, both of these Outer Banks treasures had attracted thousands of visitors from all across the country, and in 1950, four very important Lost Colony show attendees would make their mark on Roanoke Island.

Mrs. Charles Cannon, married to a North Carolina philanthropist, Mrs. Inglis Fletcher, (also a distinguished North Carolina historian and author), and Lady and Sir Evelyn Wrench, who was the founder of the English Speaking Union, had just visited the site and had taken in an evening show. Touring the grounds beforehand, it occurred to them that a two-acre garden on the outskirts of the Fort Raleigh site could lead to additional visitors, but more importantly, could stand as a natural and cultural monument to the Lost Colonists and Sir Walter Raleigh.

They proposed the idea to the local North Carolina State Garden Club in 1951, and were met with enthusiastic agreement by its thousands of members. The initial concept was a modest one. The four original proposers as well as the Garden Club aimed to construct a simple two-acre garden that represented the typical garden of a late 1500's colonist - not a show-stopping display garden by any means, but rather a modest parcel of land that would have vegetables, grains, and other staples of a colonist's diet and lifestyle.

But the plans changed when an assisting contractor, E.W. Reinecke, told members of the Garden Club about a prestigious historical garden he was dismantling at an estate in Georgia. The statues and fountains at the location were originally to be donated to the Metropolitan Museum in New York, but Reinecke suggested that the Garden Club contact the landscape architects involved, Innocenti & Webel, to see if this arrangement could be changed.

The Garden Club followed through with the suggestion, and the members were surprised to find that the Innocenti & Webel landscapers were delighted with the idea of donating the historic statues to the site of England's first American colony. As a result, the original plan of a simple garden was revised to make way for the ancient Italian fountain and pool with balustrade, wellhead, sundial, bird baths, and stone steps and benches that the architects, as well as the original Georgia estate's owner, The Honorable John Hay Whitney, had reserved especially for the new Outer Banks garden site.

With these donations serving as an abstract guide, the Webel landscapers designed an Elizabethan Era garden, slightly revised and remodeled for present times. Ironically enough, and perhaps serving as a good omen for this new direction, construction for the gardens began on the exact date that Elizabeth II was crowned, June 2, 1953. The task was an arduous one, and it wasn't until over seven years later, on August 18th, 1960, that the gardens were officially opened to the public on Virginia Dare's 373rd birthday.

Since the gardens were first established, a number of remarkable pieces of art, statues, plant species, and even the bricks themselves have been donated to the gardens from generous benefactors around the world. As a result, the gardens are an incredible collection of the old world and the new, with ancient English blooms and local trees and shrubs, all in an incredible setting that feels miles away from modern North Carolina, despite it's quiet location tucked away on Roanoke Island.

Source:https://www.outerbanks.com/elizabethan-gardens.html

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September 9th, 2012

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