Autumn Tour of the Dudley Historic Farm and the Rose Petals Nursery in Newberry, Florida
The friendly group of twenty OAHRS members and friends arrived at the Dudley Historic Farm in Newberry, FL (near Gainesville) Saturday morning, October 25th to tour the late 19th century Dudley family homestead, built by the early Florida pioneer family with twelve children. We split into two groups for the docent-guided tour guided by knowledgeable guides who delighted in sharing the history of the family and the buildings. Florida historic preservation guidelines assure the authenticity of the grounds, buildings, and the contents as being those built and used by the Dudley family. It felt like nothing had changed there in the past century. Cattle roamed the fields bordered with large oak trees. Fragrant old garden roses still bloomed and shed their lovely fragrance. The fenced turkey pen with majestic turkeys hinted at what must have been many Thanksgiving meals cooked on the big cast iron stove in the spacious kitchen.
Native Florida plants, fig trees, a large vegetable garden and the sugar cane wheel, and huge caldrons gave a sense of past fall activities. The family maintained on the grounds both a general store and a post office for the scattered population.
Delicious box lunches waited for us after the tour. Two members of the Gainesville Rose Society kindly decorated the tables in Halloween décor for us. Lunchtime gave us time to visit with each other, renewing friendships of those who have moved away and were able to take the tour with us.
Our next stop was the Rose Petals Nursery, several miles down the road. The owners, Cydney and Art Wade, after heading up the farm tour, welcomed us to their vast collection of old garden roses, one, a species musk rose, dating from the year 1513. Members chose plants to buy and bring home from a large selection of five-gallon roses, as well as smaller sizes. The weather that day was picture-perfect. Hopefully, many of the pictures taken that day will be added to this website for all to enjoy.
Our thanks go to Tim Alexander and Marjorie Brown for arranging this tour.
Submitted by Colette Cadwell
Native Florida plants, fig trees, a large vegetable garden and the sugar cane wheel, and huge caldrons gave a sense of past fall activities. The family maintained on the grounds both a general store and a post office for the scattered population.
Delicious box lunches waited for us after the tour. Two members of the Gainesville Rose Society kindly decorated the tables in Halloween décor for us. Lunchtime gave us time to visit with each other, renewing friendships of those who have moved away and were able to take the tour with us.
Our next stop was the Rose Petals Nursery, several miles down the road. The owners, Cydney and Art Wade, after heading up the farm tour, welcomed us to their vast collection of old garden roses, one, a species musk rose, dating from the year 1513. Members chose plants to buy and bring home from a large selection of five-gallon roses, as well as smaller sizes. The weather that day was picture-perfect. Hopefully, many of the pictures taken that day will be added to this website for all to enjoy.
Our thanks go to Tim Alexander and Marjorie Brown for arranging this tour.
Submitted by Colette Cadwell