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The Thriving City Of St. Augustine Celebrates Its Roots

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By MONICA BRANDIES, Tribune correspondent

Published: October 17, 2007

The city of St. Augustine on Florida's Atlantic coast is proud to be the oldest city in the United States, settled more than 50 years before the Pilgrims came.

Don Pedro Mendez de Aviles gave the city its name because he first spotted Florida on the Feast of St. Augustine, August 28, 1565. On a recent visit there, my husband, David, and I enjoyed the historic sites, the modern conveniences, the ocean and the gardens.

Many students visit Augustine to tour and learn about the state's past. Since we missed that, we went on our own. There are no large public gardens, but this is still a pleasant place for a gardener to visit.

We bought tickets for a trolley tour and were happy to learn we could use them for three days. That sure beats driving around unfamiliar streets and looking for parking places.

We got on the trolley, marked places we wanted to return to and got off in front of the Cathedral Basilica.

The city was founded by the Spanish, and in typical Spanish style, the basilica was right on the street and across from the town square, but it had two gardens, one on either side. One bordered St. George Street, a narrow street for pedestrians.

Although many of the buildings almost shared walls, every tiny opening was a garden. The Spanish Quarter opened up into several gardens with a lovely grape arbor extending to the street. Pam Wullenweber was one of the costumed women who guide people through the buildings and was especially proud of the herb garden behind the typical artillery sergeant's home.

'The Spanish were the great seed spreaders for the New World,' she said. Her garden included thriving comfrey and yarrow, rosemary, aloe, Mexican sage, white sweet potatoes that she said were rare, and several other plants. She was especially proud of her wild coffee plants.

This was the only place I saw citrus in the area, an orange tree.

'It does very well here, unless we have a hard freeze, and we haven't had one of those for 25 years,' she said. 'Of course, ours is well protected by these walls and buildings. But if it does die back, it comes up again from the roots, and in a few years we have oranges again. But no one grows them commercially in the area anymore.'

The oldest schoolhouse also was flush with the street but had a lovely garden behind it, where benches were set for the students to study outdoors. The teacher and his family lived upstairs under the steep, thatched roof, and his wife cooked in a separate kitchen out in the garden.

We got back on the trolley and rode to the oldest house in the city, which archaeologists say has had continuous occupancy from the early 1600s to when it became part of a museum. It changed some over the years and was probably damaged in the fire that burned the city in 1702. But it was rebuilt with coquina, made with the native shellstone. The garden behind it includes another grape arbor and herb garden around a separate kitchen building.

By the time we ended our first's day's tour, we were on our third tour guide, a woman named Angel. She had us going when she asked how many on the tour had met the Senator. 'He sits out by his home in the Howard Johnson's and drinks lots of water from the fountain of youth,' she said. 'At over 600, he is the oldest living resident. They call him the Old Senator because he is somewhat crooked and shady.'

The Senator is the city's oldest tree, a giant live oak. You could also call it magnificent. It does not seem to spread as far as the 350-year-old one in the Seffner yard of Harold and Betsy Welch. But that could be because of the sea breezes.

Today's Pick

Firethorn, or Pyracantha coccinea, is an evergreen shrub that also can be trained as a vine. A member of the rose family, it has clusters of small white flowers in spring and summer, followed by very decorative berries in fall and winter. Most have orange fruit, but some have red.

We used to have several lovely specimens in the Brandon area.

I was so impressed that I bought a firethorn plant, but they need full sun, and mine got lost in the garden jungle and fought back with wicked thorns until I had it taken out. It never looked like the one in the Spanish Quarter in St. Augustine, where it was a pleasure to greet an old friend.

I first saw firethorn in Pennsylvania, where it climbed up the two stories of a dormitory and was treasured for use in flower arrangements. The berries attract birds and can be used to make edible jellies.

Now's The Time To ...

•Confess to a failure that has a silver lining. I tried to get okra started this past summer. Seed came up but few thrived. Because we never got enough for a full side dish, I discovered a single pod or two sliced raw on a salad adds a delicious flavor and texture.

•Ask anyone who has or knows of a garden that should be featured in this column to e-mail me with the owner's name and phone number. If it is your own, don't be modest.

Upcoming Events

•The Suncoast Chapter of the Florida Native Plant Society meets at 7 p.m. today at the Hillsborough County Extension Office, 5339 County Road 579, Seffner. Speaker George Kish, a hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Tampa, will discuss how native grasses fill an important ecological role in all Florida plant communities and advise homeowners how to use the commonly available varieties in their landscapes. The meeting is free and open to the public. For information, call (813) 960-8132.

•The Tampa African Violet Society will meet at 10 a.m. Friday at the Seminole Garden Center , 5800 Central Ave., Tampa. Rita Fitzsimmons will present 'African Violet Pests' with a slide show. Visitors are welcome. Admission and parking are free. Call Dottie Cesario, president, at (813) 989-2934 or (813) 494-5775.

Monica Brandies can be reached at MonicaBrandies@yahoo.com.

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