Buckhead Men's Garden Club Marks 50th Anniversary

Nearly every Saturday morning Buckhead Men’s Garden Club members, gray-haired and determined, gather shovel, hose and clippers to work on a community garden in the middle of Buckhead. Each gentleman oversees his own plots in the garden or greenhouse, and the group maintains a few joint experiments.

“Ed built the bluebird boxes,” said Jim Stroup, the vegetable frontrunner, pointing to a cozy wooden home hammered on a post.

The men are an avid group of gardeners, though many did not join the club until retirement, and no member can tell you exactly how the group began. “Well now, I don’t have a hook to hang that on…” gardener Henry Grady said.

President Allen Ferrell has hopes of sifting through old files to recover meeting minutes and financial records. He estimates the club settled into its current land plot on the property of the  about 25 years ago. This year, the Buckhead Men’s Garden Club is celebrating its 50th anniversary.

Members are an average of 75 to 80 years old, but they maintain two greenhouses, a supply storehouse and a three-level garden. The men mix their own soils, collect ceramic pots from thrift stores, clean and recycle every used plastic container and use all-organic fertilizers. They sell products at the Peachtree Road Farmers Market April through December and make online sales on Craig’s List.

The team grows vegetables, fruits, flowers and herbs. Vegetable man Stroup is farming 70 tomato vines, four cantaloupes and full supplies of squash, watermelon, cucumber, lettuce and peppers. He is also securing a raccoon-defensive fence around the watermelon and cantaloupe fields.

What draws men to a garden club?

“I like being outside under the sky, under the sun,” Grady said. “Feeling the warmth of the sun on my back makes me feel alive.”

Grady is the great-grandson of Henry W. Grady (journalist and spokesman of the New South after the Civil War). Although he calls himself "wobbly," Grady's fellow gardeners say he does the most work in the garden.

Grady also added, “I’m surrounded by women most of the time... I enjoy the company of men.”

As a retired business owner himself, Stroup enjoys the company of fellow successful carrer men in the club, such as doctors and lawyers. “Very smart people come here and grow plants,” he said.

Throughout location and leadership changes, the purposes of the club have remained education and community service, according to Ferrell. The group often donates extra vegetables to community organizations and plants gardens at community homes. Each summer the club teaches Atlanta History Center day-campers about gardens. The club’s previous greenhouse at the is now used to give students gardening experience.

Unfortunately, the group has reached an age in which many members pass away, or cannot drive through Buckhead traffic to meet the group. Grady, whose wife usually drives him to the garden, said monthly evening meetings incorporate prayer and announcements, which often relay news of a member's illness or death.

Stroup said he initially joined the garden club because he read it listed as a hobby in obituaries of men who died at very old ages. "Man, if that extends your life!" he said.

President Ferrell said the group has two major goals this year: to make its services better known throughout the community, and to gain members with sons who can lead a younger generation of gardeners in the club.

This summer, although monthly meetings are suspended, the group will hold picnics, field trips and dinner parties, to which even members' wives are invited. New gardeners are always welcome to attend the weekly Saturday meetups.