Take Part in the Neighborhood Planting Project

We’re planning the planting and maintenance of hundreds of native fruit-bearing trees and bushes in the yards and public spaces of four west-side neighborhoods, for free to neighborhood landowners.

It’s easy to take part, as all you have to do is register and then pick up your trees at the arranged dates.

Pickup

Pickup will be available during your neighborhood’s planting day at these locations:

  • Waterman — 4/20/18 — Avalon Community Garden (W 8th & Hopewell)
  • Crestmont — 4/21/18 — Catholic Worker
  • Trailview — 4/27/18 — ?
  • Maple Heights — 4/28/17 — The Overlook (611 W. 12th St)

On the planting days listed above, neighbors will be able to pick up and plant their trees, with help and advice from volunteers. Free bulk mulch and soil amendments will be available.

Plant Swap

Planting days will feature a plant swap, where neighbors are encouraged to bring starts, divisions and seeds of garden or house plants that they would like to share.

Help Out

This is an all volunteer effort led by landowners in west-side neighborhoods. You can help us reach out to neighbors, lead a team on planting day, teach a workshop, or lend a hand in other ways, so email us at contact@theoverlookbloomington.org if you want to help out. We’d definitely appreciate any donations of plants or other resources.

Register

[[ Embedded google form ]]

Name

Address

Email/Contact

Request plants (type and quantity)

Interested in volunteering?
— door-to-door reaching out to landowners
— helping table or joining a team on planting day
— bringing plants or seeds to swap with neighbors
— other skills or help _______________

Plants

We chose native varieties of trees and bushes, ordered from Vallonia Nursery, for our program, including:

  • American Plum
  • Pawpaw
  • Hazelnut
  • Persimmon
  • Elderberry
  • Chokecherry
  • Pine

Sponsored Plants

Additional trees and bushes will be available to neighborhood landowners and other volunteers, as donated by local organizations, businesses, and nurseries.

Sponsors

We really appreciate these groups and people who are helping make this possible.

  • Bloomington Community Orchard
  • Partisan Gardens (?)

Are you an organization or business with plants or resources to donate to neighborhood orchard plantings? Would you like to share knowledge with neighborhood residents about your services and products? Reach out to us at contact@theoverlookbloomington.org to discuss sponsorship opportunities.

Donate

We also accept donations to put towards purchasing trees and materials, so if you’d like to support our efforts that way you can donate now!




Building Together

 

Purchased by friends pooling their money in February 2017, the renovated building will continue the late Mac Moulden’s legacy, providing shared studio space for woodworking, in addition to textiles, printing, and community meeting space.  The building will be the new home of the Glenn Carter Memorial Toolshare, Midwest Pages to Prisoners Project and The Neighborhood Planting Project.

 

The Godsey Cabinet Shop   In the early 1920’s, Carl Godsey, an employee at the nearby Showers Furniture Factory, began building and repairing custom furniture in the family wash-shed beside his home at 12th and Jackson, adding to the building little by little as the business grew. Carl’s wife Fannie soon took in other Showers workers as boarders in the home, one of whom — a young veneer installer named Guy Moulden — married their daughter Thelma and joined Carl in the off-hours business.   In 1932, Carl and his new son-in-law Guy officially opened the Godsey Cabinet Shop together at the expanded wash-shed, which soon became a landing spot for skilled craftsmen eager to do work that was more artisanal than Showers’ mass production. (“Cabinet maker” at that time meant anyone who built case goods or furniture, not just the kitchen cabinet fixtures we think of today.) Guy’s youngest son Mac would later say that he grew up in that shop, playing soldiers with his older brothers under the floorboards and, by his early teens, helping his father and grandfather with stripping and sanding. After his father’s death in 1968, Mac moved back to Bloomington from Washington DC and ran the family business continuously for 48 years with his close friend Michael Lester until his own death in 2016.   We’ve been told that the Godsey Cabinet Shop built or repaired thousands of one-of-a-kind pieces over these years, including the Japanese emperor’s bed at Indiana University, the Lincoln Desk at the Lilly Library, a Revolutionary War chest full of bullet holes, and Herman Well’s personal home furniture. Mac’s legacy lives on through his work and these stories that we continue to tell.

The Godsey Cabinet Shop

 

In the early 1920’s, Carl Godsey, an employee at the nearby Showers Furniture Factory, began building and repairing custom furniture in the family wash-shed beside his home at 12th and Jackson, adding to the building little by little as the business grew. Carl’s wife Fannie soon took in other Showers workers as boarders in the home, one of whom — a young veneer installer named Guy Moulden — married their daughter Thelma and joined Carl in the off-hours business.

 

In 1932, Carl and his new son-in-law Guy officially opened the Godsey Cabinet Shop together at the expanded wash-shed, which soon became a landing spot for skilled craftsmen eager to do work that was more artisanal than Showers’ mass production. (“Cabinet maker” at that time meant anyone who built case goods or furniture, not just the kitchen cabinet fixtures we think of today.) Guy’s youngest son Mac would later say that he grew up in that shop, playing soldiers with his older brothers under the floorboards and, by his early teens, helping his father and grandfather with stripping and sanding. After his father’s death in 1968, Mac moved back to Bloomington from Washington DC and ran the family business continuously for 48 years with his close friend Michael Lester until his own death in 2016.

 

We’ve been told that the Godsey Cabinet Shop built or repaired thousands of one-of-a-kind pieces over these years, including the Japanese emperor’s bed at Indiana University, the Lincoln Desk at the Lilly Library, a Revolutionary War chest full of bullet holes, and Herman Well’s personal home furniture. Mac’s legacy lives on through his work and these stories that we continue to tell.

Neighborhood Planting Project

The 2018 Neighborhood Planting Project was the shared work of neighbors on the west-side of Bloomington — in our first year of the project we gave away more than 1000 fruit trees and bushes, mostly planting them in yards and shared spaces in the Crestmont, Waterman, Maple Heights, and Trailview neighborhoods, and giving the rest away to farmers and gardeners in Monroe and surrounding counties. Thanks to everyone that helped make it happen! We’ve got big things planned for next year — involving more neighborhoods, a class at Harmony School, an Ellettsville orchard … and hundreds more trees and bushes to share Learn More

The 2018 Neighborhood Planting Project was the shared work of neighbors on the west-side of Bloomington — in our first year of the project we gave away more than 1000 fruit trees and bushes, mostly planting them in yards and shared spaces in the Crestmont, Waterman, Maple Heights, and Trailview neighborhoods, and giving the rest away to farmers and gardeners in Monroe and surrounding counties. Thanks to everyone that helped make it happen!

We’ve got big things planned for next year — involving more neighborhoods, a class at Harmony School, an Ellettsville orchard … and hundreds more trees and bushes to share

Learn More

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