We were fortunate to have Dr Mark Porter to give our talk in October. Mark is a trustee of the National Garden Scheme and has for several years opened his own garden and vineyard in Hampshire.
The origins if the NGS date back to the early 1900s and in 1859, William Rathbone, employed a nurse to care for his wife. When she died he retained her services and with Florence Nightingale worked to develop a service so organised district nursing began.
In 1927 Elsie Wragg thought of raising money through gardening and the NGS and garden owners were asked to open their gardens for a shilling a head.
The first guide was published in 1932 detailing 1079 gardens open for charity and today donates significant amounts of money to a range of nursing and heath charities
Despite the coronavirus outbreak the charity were able to donate £2.88 million in 2020.
Mark showed us slides of some of the lovely gardens that are open where we can spend some pleasant hours and where there is always a cup of tea and home made cake on offer in normal times.
We look forward to seeing the next yellow book and planning some summer outings again.
