Mary Clark Thompson's Garden Travels

After Frederick Thompson’s death, Mary Clark Thompson spent several years traveling throughout Europe with friends and family. On her travels she saw many beautiful estates which would influence her plans for Sonnenberg. In September of 1899, Mary and her sister Zilpha visited the Duke of Sutherland’s gardens at Trentham, in England. Zilpha wrote to their niece, Mamie, that the grounds were ideal of what a country place should be.

Unfortunately, in the years following their visit, Trentham became increasingly polluted by nearby pottery factories, and the estate was abandoned. In recent years, many of the gardens have now been restored to their original appearance.

Similarities in the two estates can be seen in the formal garden layouts, architectural elements, and statuary, particularly in Sonnenberg’s Italian Garden. Sculptures of children holding planters, low stone walls, columned structures, and graceful urns are generously used in both estates.  

Trentham estate, Staffordshire, England. © Stapleton Collection/Corbis.

Trentham estate, Staffordshire, England. © Stapleton Collection/Corbis.



Sonnenberg's Italian Garden, circa 1908.

                                     

Sonnenberg's Italian Garden, circa 2014.

The rest of Sonnenberg’s gardens would also be influenced by Mary Clark Thompson’s travels, as she incorporated ideas she encountered while touring gardens and botanical displays abroad. In 2016 we will be exploring public gardens, gardens that may have inspired Mrs. Thompson, and how Sonnenberg itself became a public garden.  

Guard Below!

Last week I made the mistake of parking under a black walnut (Juglans nigra) tree. It was a beautiful sunny morning and a "munch-munch-munch" greeted me when I got out of my car. I looked up into the green leafy branches and saw a fat squirrel munching away at a black walnut. I chuckled and went into the office.

If you are not familiar with black walnuts, this time of the year they still are on the trees and in astringent green husks - see picture to the right. Later in the season, if they have a chance, they drop and the green husks will turn a rich dark brown as they soften and rot off of the nut. The nut meats of black walnut have a strong, unique flavor that is prized by many -- including the squirrel kingdom at Sonnenberg. Even though the nuts are a wild delicacy, the shells are notoriously difficult to crack. This, however, means little to the strong-toothed squirrel.

Back to my car. When I went to leave later in the day, I saw the error of my ways. My car was littered with bits of the green walnut hulls and dried walnut hull juice with I suspect a copious amount of squirrel spit intermixed in. I immediately got this image of the squirrel sitting up in the tree in denim overalls like some backwoods cartoon character spitting his walnut "tobaccy" on my car. Yeah, I do have a vivid imagination and grew up on Looney Tunes. Lesson: squirrels and walnuts equal a mess so don't park there.

If you visit Sonnenberg this time of the year and stop for a moment to listen, you will without a doubt hear the unmistakable munch-munch-munch of some pudgy squirrel. They all have their winter feedbag on and are gorging themselves on acorns, walnuts, hickory nuts, butternuts, and more found throughout the estate. While out snapping some images yesterday for a different article for the blog, I spotted this squirrel enjoying the nuts from the black walnut's sister species, our eastern butternut (Juglans cinerea). The butternut is not as common of a sight as the black walnut but we have a number of these trees located in the Deer Park area of the park. This squirrel, clearly comfortable, in a nearby maple tree barely registered my presence. And so frequent were his obvious trips between the maple and the butternuts that a clear path in the grass between the two trees could be seen.

You know, I think that sassy squirrel even posed for me. What do you think?


Stretching out along the branch

He didn't stop munching once