The Laurent and Eliza Clerc Garden

THE ORIGINAL STORY

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In the spring of 2021, I had a chance to swing by the Laurent and Eliza grave site at the Spring Grove Cemetery. I had been to the cemetery years before but could not remember what it looked like. I found the garden pleasantly cared for despite the difficulty that the cemetery had with resources. The garden enclosure was well kept but the section of the cemetery where the oldest graves were was not yet mowed. It was then that thoughts began circulating through my mind about how this great great great great grandson might someday pay homage to Laurent and Eliza for his existence and for their contribution to America.

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But what did I know about the garden and its history? My visits were few and far between. We learn that the cemetery was established in 1845 and was one of the city's oldest cemeteries, and its first private non-sectarian cemetery. The land on which the cemetery was established was farmland owned by the Page family when Stephen Page buried his wife there in 1845. The Pages then proceeded to sell burial plots to others. In 1864 a number of plot owners banded together to purchase the entire cemetery, establishing the non-profit association that now manages the property. In 1884, the association hired landscape designer, Thomas Brown McClunnie, to lay out the cemetery's northwest quadrant. In contrast to the rural cemetery movement, McClunnie's park like setting emphasized a simple rectangular layout, rather than winding lanes that conformed to local topography. (Wikipedia)

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We know that Laurent Clerc died on July 18, 1869 and Eliza on May 17, 1880. They were some of the cemetery's earliest settlers. Not much is yet known about what happened to the grave site until 1998 when we see it renovated by a group of Laurent fans.

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When visiting several Deaf Schools in America in 1917, Henri Gaillard visited the cemetery and gave this description of the place:

“Now the automobile was taking us to Clerc's cemetery. An older one, it was located in a distant part of the city, in front of houses that were still occupied and closed o with only an iron gate. The graves were close together as in Europe and were not even situated in a regular pattern. This was the old-fashioned system. In order to locate the tomb of our fellow countryman we had to walk over the grounds. It was marked by a vertical plaque shaped like a pointed church window; it looked old and weathered, but the inscription was still visible. The words born at La Balme (France) moved us. On the sides were the graves of his wife and of a son. We placed our palm on the ground and I picked some leaves from a shrub growing behind the tombstone of Laurent Clerc.”

 

In 1992, a deaf man, Alan Barwiolek (who helped found the New York Deaf Theater as part of a lifelong campaign to make things better for those living in the Silent World where he was born, died April 17, 1996. He was 43 years old and was an associate professor of sign language studies at Union College in Plainfield, NJ.) visited the graves of the Clercs. 

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He was appalled by the deteriorated and vandalized gravestones and launched a nationwide campaign to restore the gravestones. His efforts have benefited from the support of countless individuals and organizations, including the Laurent Clerc Cultural Fund of the Gallaudet University Alumni Association. Six years later, the honor was returned to the Clercs with the unveiling of new tombstones at their final resting place.

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The Friends of the National Association of the Deaf, The Gallaudet University Alumni Association, the American School for the Deaf and the Les Anciens Eleves L'INJS de Paris-France (assume a alumni association of Laurent's Paris school) replaced the old headstones with new granite ones. On a rainy day on April 17, 1998, on the 181st anniversary of the founding of the American School for the Deaf the dedication of the new headstones occurred.

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A fascinating story surrounded the dedication that day. Apparently the installation of the new headstones resulted in Laurent's being over Eliza and vice versa. A quick witted admirer caught the problem and the headstones were properly re-installed before the ceremony. 

 

The older headstones were spirited off to the ASD history room in the old school building. When this building was razed in 2015 to make way for the modern school the headstones made their way to the Cogswell House Museum, where they can be seen to this day.

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There is some evidence that the American School for the Deaf helped maintain the grave site. Some years the American School for the Deaf made school visits as part of their classroom instruction.

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Now back to 2021, this undertaking was going to be large and would take many loving hands to make it possible. The condition in September showed how wild the enclosure came without the proper care.

 

Since I live in Montreal, QC it was going to require some more local help. Of course, the American School for the Deaf (ASD) was the first thing I thought of. I shot off an email to Jeff Bravin, Director and he responded that he was committed to having the school help.

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Of course no fun happens without the help of Jean, curator at the Cogswell House Museum, and my distant cousin Darlene who attended and works that ASD to this day. They were very enthusiastic and we three egged each other on.

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It was of course important to involve the Spring Grove Cemetery in our project. We did not know how they would react to our ideas. The office at the cemetery never seemed to have anyone in it but their green door gave me the information I needed. I phoned Ray, the manager, explaining Laurent's and Eliza's contribution. He was very excited about our project and gave us carte blanche immediately to design a garden and install it.

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The hitch was that I am not a gardener and surely not a garden designer. As luck would have it my daughter, Sarah, was friends with Carly who is a garden designer in the Washington DC area. Carly was kind enough to create a garden diagram with a plant list to guide us at the nursery.

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While we  all waited for the money and spring to come it was decided that we would clean up the grave site and get to know our tableau. In October I organized a clean up event where 13 volunteers worked to prepare the ground for the spring planting. Flat Laurent was there watching our progress and keeping us on task.

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We wanted to keep our garden project as local as possible and for this reason we chose Moscarillo's Garden Shoppe close to the West Hartford campus of ASD for our perennial plants. The dilemma we now faced  was how to pay for it all.

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There is a world full of ways to fund raise for something like this but I wished to get into the habit of using Go-Fund-Me.  https://gofund.me/72cfa697

Any long stamp project related to Laurent Clerc was going to cost some dollars and it was good to learn the begging for money touch early. After 4 months of work we were able to raise from our lovely donors approximately $3000 USD for the cause.

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Then in May 2022, with garden design, plant list, volunteers and a load of greenbacks I made my way back to Moscarillo's. On the day of installation they delivered the plans by truck before the volunteers worked for 6 grueling hours to get the plans into the ground. We all left there with a great sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. We hoped for great things over the next 3 years as the perennial garden would take shape.

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I know that I stated earlier that I was not a gardener and I went on to prove it almost immediately. On my early June return to check on the progress of the perennials I found that the graveyard groundhogs (said to be 30 in number) had consumed all the phlox plants (about a 1/4 of the garden). Apparently phlox is like candy to them and they were eaten to the ground. Not to be deterred, I did some homework and purchased groundhog resistant plants for their replacements. While I had to solve the long grass issues, the plants seemed to be doing well and it was taking on the look of a somewhat wild country garden.

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If only we could get some mulch around those plants and help us keep the weeds and grass down. With only monthly trips to care for the garden it was going to be hard taming it. Jeff Bravin came to our rescue again and arranged for the ASD grounds contractor, BrightView, to come and mulch all around the plants. We were somewhat confused when they contacted us and said they could not figure out where to put the mulch. Interesting, we thought it was a no brainer.

 

Confused, but have cleared many gardening hurdles already, I was feeling very sure of myself and looking forward to my next visit. Nothing was to prepare me for the horror and shock of what I was going to see. Somehow the cemetery mowing contractor had decided to weed wack and mow down all the flowers in the enclosure. I could of course not fathom how someone would take that decision but there was no going back. Cemetery manager, Ray, was equally horrified. The upside of this travesty was that Ray agreed to allow us to take all responsibility for the enclosure in the future and the contractor was asked not to ever step inside again.

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We did not know how many of the perennial plants were going to survive. Mowed to the ground, we might only know next spring when they returned. Some rebounded quickly while others were either dead or laying dormant. I staked out the plant locations to make sure we did not weed them in the spring. BrightView returned and mulched all around the plants.

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Then we waited. But then a drought came for over two months. There is no water close to the enclosure and all of it has to be brought in by hand. The grounds crew and the cemetery understandably could not take responsibility for it. Between my monthly trips I had anxiously watched the rain tables and hoped that our drought resistant species would survive the summer. Things looked hopeless at times and we feared all these catastrophes were going to set us back at least a year.

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Plants are amazing beings. Despite the cuttings and the lack of water some of them began to thrive. Trips to the garden in September, October and then November showed their resilience. A garden was indeed taking shape.

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While awaiting the final damage report this coming spring of 2023 there is still lots to do. When the plants are up in the spring we will have a better idea where to lay down the layer of wood chips. In the meantime we laid down a wood chip border and cut the stringy grass. Plans are percolating about replacing the grass with gravel so that grass care becomes a mute point. There is a lot of winter studying to be done so that this non-gardener does not weed perennials in the spring.

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Ray and I are working on repairing a fallen headstone of Laurent and Eliza's second son, Charles Michael Clerc, who died in young adulthood. A tombstone restorer has taken photos and we are awaiting the estimates.

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Until I am able to secure more routine care and maintenance of the garden my monthly visits will have to suffice. I have begun to make contacts with local gardening groups in the hopes of finding further expertise and help in making it through next summer's drought.

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Keep tuned in here for progress and updates. If you wish to contribute financially to this project please go to 

https://gofund.me/72cfa697 and contribute. If you are a gardener or water carrier drop us a line at societelaurentclerc@gmail.com.

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