An Urban Eden's Troubled Rebirth

"Put in a bench and they'll just go in and smoke crack."

by Bruce Schimmel

Agood time to enjoy the big shady maples and the great Victorian architecture on the 2100 block of Venango Street is a Saturday morning. It may be the only time.

For those not familiar with the ways of "the big dark forest," as Pastor Lola calls her Tioga neighborhood, Saturday morning is the safest time for visitors. It's also one of the few times that some of its residents — especially the elderly — will venture beyond their barbed-wire nests.

On Saturday mornings, the crackheads are still asleep. The boarded-up Magnolia Bar on nearby Hunting Park Avenue is shuttered during daylight. Which means for now the only action is an old woman in rags, standing in broken glass and asking passers-by for "50 cent."

On a recent Saturday, about a dozen visitors from Germantown, Center City and New Jersey came to Venango. Not to score weed from a plexi-armored window, but to pull weeds out of a big, overgrown lot. These volunteers from Greater Philadelphia Cares arrived with shovels, rakes and the hope that they could restore what was once a large and lovely community garden.

The outsiders were met by a trio of neighborhood ladies, who plied the volunteers with a stack of snapshots taken in the '90s. The pictures show a younger Doris, Dorothy and Clarentha, surrounded by a garden of eggplants, peppers, cabbage and beans. Under a big old oak, they're making barbecue for family and neighbors.

Today the women are all in their 70s, and the old oak is choking in vines. During the previous week, volunteers had posted flyers announcing the "Beautification Project," and invited the community to help.

But for now, only these three old ladies have ap-peared. Still, the women fire up some charcoal and start grilling. Not to worry, they say. The smell of barbecue will attract more people from the neighborhood.

As the visitors strip vines from trees and rake glass out of the soil, another neighbor does emerge. Sharon, in her late fifties, approaches the elderly Clarentha, and starts to mock her.

"These people are doing a really nice job cleaning up, but it ain't gonna work," says Sharon. "You're fantasizing. You're making shit up. You think it's like the old days."

Upset, Clarentha warns Sharon to watch her mouth, saying she's "gone too far." But Sharon keeps on going.

"The people who took care of this garden are dead," says Sharon, who wears a small gold dollar sign as a pendant. "And if you put a bench in there, the young people will just go in and smoke crack."

A short while later, someone discovers a cache of crack works just inside the chain-link fence. A couple of weeks ago, Frank from L&I had hauled away a huge load of glass and needles, so he isn't surprised.

The L&I guy has taken a personal interest in the project, and he arrives just as the ladies set out lunch.

"We don't let people in until we first send in the [bulldozing] machines," says Frank. "Those needles will pierce your boots," he adds, chomping on a hot sausage.

Frank remembers back in the '90s when this garden won prizes from the Philadelphia Block Garden Program, whose rusted sign still hangs on the fence. Frank knows about neighborhoods gone bad, and calls this "one of the baddest. Which is a shame, since the architecture is so beautiful."

The ladies say that their garden began to wither as local factories closed — the loss of the Budd plant was especially detrimental. Then the city stopped helping with cleaning, and "we didn't find anyone to help us."

As volunteers continue to scrape glass and hack at weeds, the barbecue does its magic. More neighbors arrive. A polite young man with dreadlocks looks interested. And then Bob arrives, whom the ladies especially hoped to tempt. A big man with powerful hands, Bob used to help groom the site. And today he says he may still be interested.

But Sharon remains unconvinced. "Come back here in two months, and see if all this shit ain't back," she says. Still, she accepts a hot dog from Clarentha — as a few neighbors gather with the outsiders for a group portrait under the newly groomed old oak.

(bruce@schimmel.com)