The Garden

Events circa 1937-1972. 
Written April 1994.

In 1937, the Robert Dials moved, with Robert and Dolly, their two children, from the City of Cleveland to the Village of Fairview. Fairview lay just beyond Rocky River’s Lorain Avenue Bridge, offering an escape from the city to the country.

It was quite a change for all of us. Robert now had to drive at least fifty blocks to his office. Previously, he could run up one flight of stairs to our apartment and home. The children had had no place to play, except in a fenced-in roof garden and on city sidewalks, where they had to be chaperoned. The only time they could contact Mother Earth was when I took them to parks in my Model A Ford. It was difficult being cook, laundress, and babysitter simultaneously, so it was a great blessing and relief to be able to let them run and play in the back lawn and garden.

The garden proved to be a great learning experience for all of us. Robert didn’t know a dandelion from a petunia. The rest of us weren’t much more knowledgeable, but he learned rapidly along with the rest of us. We studied books and joined the Garden Club, which had experienced people who could answer our many questions.

Then there were those glowing, promising seed catalogs like Burpees, which we studied avidly and gullibly. The result was we had quite a respectable garden after several years – divided by three nice grassy sod paths. It was never a showplace, partly because it was beyond a hedge of flowering bushes at the back of our back lawn.

The ground was loam and friable. It had been cared for by generations of truck farmers who knew how to care for the sod, keeping it fertile. Things grew lush and well in it.

Robert experimented and grew beautiful varieties of dahlias along both sides of the 60-foot-long main path. Behind that, on one side, we planted beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, and several varieties of squash.

One summer we had two long rows of beans parallel to the dahlias. I took our dog Buttons out with me to survey the crops one morning, proudly standing at the head of the path, viewing the fine stand of beans that were just beginning to bear.

I noticed in disgust that quite a few had been nibbled by rabbits, I supposed. Just then Buttons flushed out a rabbit while running around the bottom of the garden. Believe it or not, that rabbit came charging toward me between the rows full tilt, with Buttons on its tail.

I had never before had a wild animal come at me intent on assault and at such speed, so I instinctively defended myself. I hauled off with a mighty kick with my great toe protruding from my sandal, hitting the little beastie square on its nose. It rolled over and died instantly. I didn’t mean to do it. Neither Buttons nor I knew what to do. Poor little bunny.

I recalled my father and little brother growing Belgian hares for the meat market and pin money for brother Carl. They butchered them and I often helped when there was a rush order, so I was probably the only lady in Fairview who knew how to do such an unladylike procedure. I again used this unique skill because Buttons deserved a good dinner for her heroic efforts in doing in a predator.

However, Buttons sensitivities exceeded my own for she turned up her black nose and refused to eat my cooking. This failure added insult to the injury of the epithets they bestowed upon me – even going to Greek Mythology to call me Diana the Huntress.

We lived only one block from the Metropolitan Park, “The Emerald Necklace,” where all wildlife was protected. It gave us a series of invasions by opossums, groundhogs, squirrels, rabbits, and birds. We caught specimens of all these critters, along with the neighbors’ cats, in our new “Have A Heart” trap. This trap was a yard-long steel mesh cage with trap doors at both ends and a tilting feeding table in the middle for holding the bait.

When the animal entered and stepped on the feeding table, the propped-open doors would drop shut, locking the unhurt, surprised, and angry beast inside. We always allowed the cats and birds immediate freedom, but the critters got a ride back down into the park before letting them go into their beloved wild.

One day I caught a big, fat raccoon. I put him, trap and all, into the deck of the car and headed far north to the yacht club parking lot. I told myself that I was too tired to lift the trap out on the ground as I usually did. I just opened the doors and out ran the raccoon – not out of the car but into a ventilation hole in the back of the deck. It lodged itself there, safely protected between the back wall of the deck and the back seat.

I found a stout stick, which I poked in the hole to scare him out. I could hear him scurry around to avoid my prodding, but he would not come out.

I finally gave up, slammed the door down, and headed back home to- my favorite gas station. I was greeted with “Well, Mrs. Dial, what’s the trouble now?” I said, “I have a raccoon in my car, and I can’t get it out.”

He opened the deck and went through the same routine I had used – to no avail. He took the back of the back seat out of the car, and there sat the culprit.

Quick as lightning he saw the open door, jumped out, and made a beeline across lots to our home on West 196th street. I think he beat me home!

Another time, I had a beautiful stand of twelve healthy cabbage plants just ready to head, which I proudly watered at eleven o’clock one morning. At four o’clock, I went down to see them, and they were all eaten to the ground. I knew it had to be a groundhog because no other animal could eat that much in one sitting. We caught him also a few days later.

Then there was the 20-foot square raspberry patch behind the garage. It was prolific, producing much good eating right in the patch while the children picked for the family. I made many fresh desserts, frozen jam, and jelly from these berries.

One rule had to be followed. They [the children ed.] had to mark the number of quarts or pints they picked each day on a special kitchen calendar. At the end of the season, my Michael grandchild, the mathematician, carefully counted the number of quarts picked. He exclaimed, “Wow! Grandma, do you realize we ate over $400 worth of raspberries this season?”

There were fruit trees, a Queen Anne cherry, peach trees, two pear trees, and one grafted apple tree. It grew several apple varieties and two branches of pears all on one tree. These all produced much pleasure in their season.

The grape arbor behind the garage bore sweet green grapes, purple concords, and big pink grapes. They made good snacks and much good juice.

The whole garden was fenced in by an irregular hedge of various flowering bushes, pink wygelia, honeysuckle, bridal wreath, spirea, rose of Sharon, hibiscus, and many others that not only gave us privacy but much beauty as the seasons passed.

Our greatest triumph was at the Fall Garden Show, where everything that was entered had to be horticulturally perfect. Robert had grown beautiful pink dahlias that year that had concentric rows of perfect petals in every blossom. I placed the largest and most perfect in the center of the huge pale green vase that ordinarily served as an umbrella stand in the front hall.

I stood some of the big ones in the center of it, flanked by matching smaller ones. Then I placed long, graceful sumac leaves around the outer edge to make a green, graceful line. I thought it was pretty, but the expert gardeners in the club were quite incensed because I used weeds (the sumac) in my arrangement.

The women whispered to each other behind their hands – the men told me in plain English “It is not proper to use weeds in an arrangement.” I entered it anyway, and the judges awarded it the grand prize — the outstanding prize of the show.

I cherished the blue and gold ribbon it won that day despite the “hubbub” it created, for I never did so well again.

Remembering the whole experience of the garden gives me a feeling of pleasure…

Mary W. Dial

Transcribed May 1994.
Posted Apr 14, 1994 at 00:43.
Revised Jan 23, 2023 at 20:26. EDT.
Retrieved May 30, 2026 at 15:06.
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