Tonight we had an excellent NOBS Forums presentation with some mighty fine show-and-tells! The program was co-sponsored by the Native Plant Society and featured two librarians from our cultural institutional libraries.
Gary Esmonde from the Cleveland Botanical Gardens gave a wonderful talk about the literature of Cleveland gardening, from new guide books from Lone Pine Publishing to the Ellen Biddle Shipman garden design at the Gwinn estate, and from histories of the cultural gardens to a treastice on the Moses Cleaveland trees. Apparently, there are maps so you can go find these protected trees and know that they were here when Moses Cleaveland came to town circa 1796.
Wendy Wasman from the Cleveland Natural History Museum brought some amazing pieces from the rare books collection. One tree book had razor-thin samples of wood, and a mushroom book included a stereoscope with slides. She also brought a folio book of orchids with gorgeous chromolithographs. Fabulous treasures. Cleveland needs to appreciate and use these amazing resources more.
