The 21st Century Matriarch

Continuing the photographic tour of Brookside Gardens from yesterday’s post….

I always make an effort to see the deciduous magnolias blooming at Brookside and they were at the top of my ‘to see’ plan for this mini road trip. The first one I saw was quite a shock. All the flowers had been destroyed by the frosts. The tree won’t be producing any seeds this year. The drying remains of the flowers were glowing in the morning light….interesting looking but ultimately not positive for the tree.

I would occasionally see a tree that I thought might have escaped the frost damage

2021 04 m IMG_7199 (8).jpg — But a closer look always showed that the flowers were damaged. The might still be intact enough to draw insects and maybe produce seeds.

At least one tree had buds that looked normal – the late bloomer might be the one with the successful seed production this year.

The tulips are the other big display in April. Some of the beds also had fading hyacinths. I like to photograph tulips that appear to be glowing from within….and there were several situations that provided the opportunity for that.

Benches at Brookside always look appealing to me but I rare sit down. Usually I am walking around, taking pictures of anything that looks interesting. Maybe I should try something different next time I visit….pick a spot and sit for a bit.

2021 04 o IMG_7175 (2).jpg — A project idea – maybe take pictures of tree trunks that includes the name of the tree (many of the trees at Brookside are labeled like this. It would be good to have as a reference.

2021 04 o IMG_7175 (3).jpg — I always like the stone sphere sculpture. Sometimes there are early butterflies that warm up in the sunshine around it…but I didn’t see any while I was there.

On the way back to the car, I stopped again to photograph the lush horsetail bed at one corner of the visitor center….and that was the last stop of my walk. The parking lot was filling up and I was glad I had come early enough to avoid the crowd.

The Internet Archive is such a great resource. I’ve been thinking recently about how frustrating it was when I was growing up – getting to the library…finding something in the card catalog then discovering that it wasn’t available. Or going to the ‘Books in Print’ reference and finding a reference to a book that I wanted to get…but then finding the library didn’t have it and didn’t have an easy way to get it. Periodicals were in thick bound volumes….if the library had the publication. Somehow my hours at the library were more frustrating than enlightening. I became aware early on that ‘research’ in the library was not as productive as I wanted it to be. Now we have access to so much via a simple search on the internet; the more challenging problem is checking the validity of the references found.

The items I find on Internet Archive are general books that are dated…but reflect a perspective of the time they were written/created. I tend to look more at the images than read the text….but what a rich experience that level of browsing can be!

Grindon, Leo H. Lancashire – brief historical and descriptive notes. London: Seeley and Co. 1892. Available from Internet Archive here. I gleaned images from the book that depict children…an immigrant mother hunched over her baby, children out and about in wet or cold weather, a dinner hour where a younger girl appears to be barefoot and without a shawl/scarf, and then children working in a cotton factory and glass-blowing. The late 1800s were a time when some children started working early in their teens and worked long hours….enough that it impacted their health (i.e. rickets, lung problems).

Holland, Clive. Things seen in Japan. London: Seeley and Co. 1911. Available from Internet Archive here. Again – I selected pictures that include children. In the first one I noticed the shoes – placed on the ground under the bench…and what about the other child on the bench a little further away. The ‘big sisters’ in the other picture look a little tired…and how did the photographer know that the babies were all ‘little brothers’?

Sakai Hoitsu (Japanese, 1761-1828). The slideshow of this artist’s work is available from Internet Archive here. Do you recognize the deciduous magnolia?