Nightingale Community Garden
Elnora Thompson & Karen Chaffee at the Nightingale Community Garden
Boston, MA, 2011
Photographer unknown
BNAN Historic Photograph Collection, The Trustees
The Trustees Boston Community Gardens are living, growing city spaces. These green oases nestled within dense, dynamic urban neighborhoods, serve as fresh air gathering places providing people with the opportunity to grown their own food. With origins in the 1970s grassroots movement, amid a time of racial division and tension in Boston, these gardens continue as symbols of neighborhood advocacy and inclusion. Transcending culture, race, age, and economic status, Bostonians come together to work together in these special places.
In this photo taken in 2011 at the Nightingale Community Garden, Elnora Thompson and Karen Chaffee celebrate a harvest of pumpkins. Located in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston, the Nightingale Garden was established in the 1970s by residents who reclaimed an empty lot and transformed it into a shared garden. Today, the Nightingale Community Garden has 134 plots that serve over 250 gardeners who grow more than 25,000 pounds of fresh produce annually.
