The Virginia-Pilot, Virginia August 14, 2006 Mending a fence, bonding neighbors in Portsmouth By JANIE BRYANT The Virginian-Pilot PORTSMOUTH - At 6 p.m. on a recent Sunday, it's still too hot to want to stray far from an air conditioner.
But a muster of Olde Towne residents has shown up outside an open warehouse to scrape the rust off panels of wrought-iron fencing. When all 30 or so panels have been restored, a 180-foot antique fence will embellish a quiet park on a corner of one of the neighborhood's gateways. Washington Street park is an open space from another time, just like this neighborhood of homes dating back to the 18th century. And it's just one of the community spots that keep the civic league's beautification committee dreaming up garden projects and hunting for old fountains, park benches and other landscaping props. John Joyce, chairman of the committee, spotted the wrought-iron fence panels two or three years ago at an antiques store near Richmond. He walked away from it reluctantly, not knowing if everyone would agree it belonged in Olde Towne and knowing the hurdles of approval would go beyond the civic league. It's not like Olde Towne's beautification chairman doesn't have his own landscape to worry about. Joyce, a family doctor, has one of the larger gardens in the neighborhood, a healthy lot next to a Greek Revival -style home that is closing in on its century mark. The weeds there sometimes grow a little taller while he's out clipping shrubs or pulling weeds at one of the neighborhood's four parks, though. Fortunately, it's a fast-growing affliction in Olde Towne. Over the last four years, the beautification committee has grown from a handful of civic league members to about 20. And it grows by one or more people every time members meet or gather to work. In the early days, the first members had organized around the problem of litter and dog walkers who didn't use pooper scoopers. One by one, they started taking on the neighborhood's parks and public spaces. "I think it just got to be the hip committee to be on," said Jeannette Rainey, another member. The Washington Street park, at one time, was basically taken over by too many trees, including a huge cedar that covered an entire sidewalk and blocked the park's lantern light. "It started out as a Christmas tree put in the corner of the park," Rainey said. Over the years, the tree "started engulfing the whole park," she said. Then Hurricane Isabel came along and settled the matter, taking down the cedar and other trees - and sparking a revival of the public space. "In one year, that park had a face-lift," Rainey said. It became something of a passion for a lot of the committee members, including Joyce. The committee has a three-part master plan and has planted about 40,000 flower bulbs that provide a spring flower show between the Washington Street and North Street parks. And Joyce couldn't stop thinking how great the wrought-iron fence would look at the Washington Street park. He showed photos of it at civic league meetings and finally went back and paid about $4,800 of his own money to buy it, figuring it would be easy enough to sell if the fence didn't win approval. A new wrought-iron fence would cost at least four times that amount, Joyce said. He estimates this fence is about 125 years old. "Overall, it is in very good shape, to be sitting out all those years," he said. When he took it to the city's Commission of Architectural Review, a couple of members didn't think a park should be fenced in, he said. "I said 'I don't know - historically, they all had fences. So did all the schools. So did the courthouses, the churches. That was a sign of public space." Most people liked it, he said. The fence is about 3 feet tall with rounded finials. Joyce described it as a fence typical of the Victorian period but welcoming and not too tall. The fence got its green light, and the league began selling $250 engraved plaques that will help pay for the project. On this particular Sunday, the committee is holding the fourth in a series of what's been pegged "Get Off the Fence" parties. About 20 people show up, a number most neighborhoods would be glad to see at a civic league meeting. "It's because it's an Italian dinner," someone jokes, referring to the feast they will all gather for later at Joyce's house. The work site is a warehouse that Joyce shares with two neighbors. It's serious space for their collective hobbies of woodworking, restoration of classic cars and, in Joyce's case, antique frames and mirrors. Two of the wrought-iron panels have been laid across saw horses. Dressed in various degrees of old paint and gardening clothes, the volunteers squeeze in wherever they see a spot to work. For one person, the job would be as much fun as scrubbing the Seawall with a tooth brush, but with their numbers, the work takes on the feel of a block party. "Camaraderie is half of it," Joyce said. Snippets of conversation float over the swishing of wire brushes and the whir of power tools. They talk about whose brush works the best and who went to the opera. They talk about the heat and about someone's trip to Ireland. A couple walks up and someone yells, "Hey, our welder!" Whoops and cheers fill the air for Fred Genera, a Shea Terrace resident who has so far spent more than 220 hours welding and making repairs to the fence panels. The beautification committee is a group unusual in its numbers and devotion, said Irv Lindley, president of the civic league. A big part of the civic league's mission is preservation of the neighborhood. And the enthusiasm on the beautification committee goes beyond the restoration of individual homes to the streets and public spaces of Olde Towne, he said. ______________________________________________________ The American Community Gardening Association listserve is only one of ACGA's services to community gardeners. 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