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HOKTICULTUKE 



April 26, 1919 



COMMUNITY BETTERMENT. 



Address by Geo. N. Smith, Wellesley, 

 Mass., before The Gardeners' .v Florists 

 C'luli of Boston, April 15, 1»19, 



Community betterment In its broad 

 sense includes betterment or improve- 

 ment in any and every direction that 

 will tend to make a city, town or vil- 

 lage more desirable as a place in 

 which to live. 



Moral improvement, religious im- 

 provement, political improvement, 

 aesthetic improvement, etc., but when 

 a person speaks of community or vil- 

 lage improvement he is generally un- 

 derstood as meaning and probably 

 does mean improving the outward ap- 

 pearance of the place. Cleaning it up 

 — ornamenting it — making it more at- 

 tractive — more pleasing to the eye. 

 Here is a work in which we may all 

 take part with the expenditure of very 

 little time or effort and little or no 

 money— it is the little things that 

 count— little pieces of paper— little 

 candy boxes— cigarette cases — paper 

 bags, etc. may not amount to much 

 taken singly but collectively strewn 

 about the streets and door yards they 

 make quite a disreputable looking vil- 

 lage. It is easier to keep clean than 

 to make clean and if none of us will 

 throw litter on the streets there will 

 be none to pick up. If each and every 

 one of us will keep his own premises 

 and the street adjoining clean and 

 neat the trick is turned — the whole 

 town is clean and nobody has been put 

 to much inconvenience or expense. 



When we get the town clean the 

 next thing is to ornament it. In grad- 

 ing, laying out walks and driveways, 

 there can be no set rules. We must 

 meet conditions as we find them, but 

 we should aim to make our grades 

 pleasing to the eye, avoiding all 

 sharpness. Don't make terraces with 

 sharp angles unless absolutely neces- 

 sary. They are costly to make and 

 costly and difficult to maintain. Try 

 to have graceful curves where there is 

 much ascent or descent. In laying out 

 walks and driveways remember that 

 they are for use and not for ornament 

 and should be as few and as direct as 

 possible, the shortest distance between 

 two points being a straight line. It 

 may be argued that there is no beauty 

 in a straight line, but in this case it 

 has the advantage of utility, whereas I 

 think I am safe in saying that there is 

 neither beauty, utility nor common- 

 sense in cutting up the grass with a 

 lot of meaningless curves. 



I do not wish to be understood as 

 advocating absolutely straight walks 

 or drives in all cases; far from it in 

 most cases especially if the entrance is 

 not directly in front of the house 

 slight curves may be introduced to 



good advantage but they should go 

 comparatively direct from point to 

 point so that there will be no tempta- 

 tion to cut across the grass. If the 

 curves or driveways are too pro- 

 nounced they are sure to be cut by the 

 wheels of vehicles. 



As I just said we do not make walks 

 and driveways for beauty. Green 

 grass is much more pleasing to the 

 eye than gravel or concrete. 



Now if our grading is done and our 

 walks laid out we may consider plant- 

 ing trees and shrubbery. Here again, 

 there can be no hard and fast rules, 

 but there are a few general principles 

 to bear in mind. It is said that the A. 

 B. C. of landscape planting is plant in 

 groups, avoid straight lines, keep your 

 centers open. Plant your shrubbery 

 along the underpinning of the house or 

 other buildings, along the boundary 

 lines of your lot and in the corners, 

 don't scatter individual plants all 

 over your lawn so that it is not evi- 

 dent whether you intended to have a 

 lawn or a shrubbery. Have one or the 

 other. Be careful not to plant so as to 

 hide a pleasant view, but if there is an 

 unsightly object that you wish to cover 

 up then plant so as to hide it from 

 view, as landscape men say "plant it 

 out." 



We can't do better than to take 

 nature for a teacher. Of course we 

 can't imitate nature very closely be- 

 cause nature uses only natural con- 

 ditions and material, whereas we have 

 to deal with the artificial. Nature has 

 no buildings, streets, walks, driveways, 

 clothes line yards, etc. with which to 

 contend. Nature teaches variety. In 

 nature there are no two scenes alike, 

 no duplicates. We often hear the ex- 

 pression "as alike as two peas in a 

 pod," but as a matter of fact there 

 never were two peas alike. Nature 

 never made any two things alike, so 

 in our planting we should have no two 

 views alike, no two beds, no two 

 groups of shrubbery. Large growing 

 trees should not be planted in small 

 front yards. I have seen Norway 

 spruces planted in front of houses 

 which stood not more than twenty feet 

 from the street line. Just imagine how 

 they will look in a few years from 

 now. I have also seen a weeping mul- 

 berry in the center of a field of several 

 acres, which was the other extreme, 

 and looked nearly as much out of 

 place as the spruces in the small 

 yards. 



For best effect trees and shrubs 

 should be allowed to grow naturally, 

 do not trim them into regular forms 

 and destroy the natural gracefulness 

 and beauty which is characteristic of 

 each tree or shrub. Each tree or shrub 

 has a peculiarity of its own which 



should be preserved and pruning 

 should be practiced merely to assist 

 nature in removing dead or dying 

 wood, thinning where the head has be- 

 come too thick or to cut off a strag- 

 gling branch. 



Two men were riding by a place 

 where a number of evergreens were 

 sheared into so called "fancy shapes." 

 One remarked "That man has taste;" 

 the other replied, "Well, if he has it is 

 mighty poor taste." 



The proper time to prune shrubs is 

 when they are through flowering, if 

 they are pruned in early spring as is 

 the usual custom the flowering wood is 

 cut away. Evergreens need very lit- 

 tle pruning except to keep them in 

 shape which should be done just be- 

 fore growth starts in the spring. 



In pruning trees all cuts should be 

 made close to and even with the trunk 

 so that the wounds will heal over 

 smoothly and not leave unsightly 

 bunches. A cut made close to the 

 trunk will heal very quickly whereas if 

 a stub is left it will take several years 

 to heal and in the meantime it may de- 

 cay and produce a cavity extending 

 down the tree. 



Lantern slides were shown showing 

 different ways of grading, different 

 ways of laying out walks and drive- 

 ways, the effect of trees and shrubs in 

 beautifying places, good and bad prun- 

 ing, the difference between natural and 

 artificial landscapes; one showed the 

 unsightly signs put up by the Metro- 

 politan Park Commission. 



NEWS NOTES. 



J. G. Jack will conduct a field class 

 at the Arnold Arboretum on Satur- 

 days, commencing April 26th, to as- 

 sist those who wish to gain a more in- 

 timate knowledge of native and for- 

 eign trees and shrubs which grow in 

 New England. No technical knowl- 

 edge Is required as the instruction is 

 simple. 



NEW CORPORATIONS. 



Evansville, Ind. — Lockyear Floral 

 Co., dealers in plants and flowers, cap- 

 ital stock, $25,000. Incorporators, Mel- 

 vin H. Lockyear, L. E. Price and Ethel 

 B. Price. 



NOTICE. 



Mr. Thos. W. Berridge is no longer 

 connected with Horticulture, all com- 

 munications will hereafter be ad- 

 dressed to and receive prompt atten- 

 tion from 



Horticulture 



147 Summer St.. 



Boston. 



