On a raised bed of dirt are the letters of the alphabet and a plant for each letter: from aloe to zucchini. The alphabet garden at Lakes Regional Park is one of the highlights of the Children’s Garden there, and its existence is due to the tireless efforts of Sue Moore.
Amanda Inscore Amanda Inscore/The News-Press
Sue Moore started the Children’s Garden in Lakes Park
The tells of Parkinson’s disease barely show, as Sue moves around the garden rattling off information about what is there now, and her big plans for its future.
The Children’s Garden at Lakes Park is not the only achievement for Sue who has volunteered more than 1,000 hours at the park over the past 20 years.
She has given guided bird tours, helped establish the yearly Bird Fest, established the annual Scarecrows in the Park fundraiser and became a board member of the Lakes Park Enrichment Foundation. She took gardening classes and began helping in the gardens. She volunteered in the Fragrance Garden and the Community Garden. Five years ago, she began her most ambitious project of creating the Children’s Garden.
“The inspiration for this came when I attended several garden meetings,” Sue explains. “I heard about children’s gardens, and we have a park that attracts all kinds of children. Most botanic gardens have to really work to get the children to come, and they are here. So I thought we should really think about a children’s garden.”
Now the 2-acre Children’s Garden has the alphabet area of vegetables and herbs, a pollination station, butterfly garden, flowers and a storybook walk.
Sue is working on plans to add an educational pavilion for story time and programs.
“We have planned a learning grove under the big elm tree,” she says. “This is the biggest elm tree in Lee County. It is at least 100 years old.”
She also has a dream of creating a giant sun and Earth sculpture to encourage children and their parents to care for the planet.
“We don’t think about the fact that we are a speck in space going around the sun, and that is a concept that is important to give to everyone on Earth,” Sue says. “We are a speck, but it is our speck. It is where we live, and we have to visualize that we are just a miniscule particle of the universe. We have to take care of it.”
To help children visualize this, she wants to create a giant sun with the seven colors of light and Earth circling it.
“That will be here in the garden to remind us that we have to take care of our Earth and we are poisoning our Earth now,” she says. “The biggest construction will be the sun garden, because I want it to be visible from the playground, so people will see it and say, ‘Oh, what is that? I want to see it.’”
Erin White, the executive director of the Lakes Park Enrichment Foundation, says Sue is an inspiration.
“She is considered the visionary of the foundation,” Erin says. “It has been her fondest desire for many years to have a place in Lakes Park where families can go and not only play but learn. She’s absolutely incredible. Her level of dedication has not waned despite her physical challenges.”
Amanda Inscore Amanda Inscore/The News-Press
Sue Moore started the Children’s Garden in Lakes Park
Being a part of children’s lives isn’t new for Sue. She graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University with a degree in English literature and taught English in junior high and high school. She and her husband, Frank, have four children and five grandchildren. Yet Sue never planned to be ensconced in a children’s garden. She says she was not a gardener, but a birder.
She and Frank moved to Fort Myers from Binghamton, New York, in 1998.
“I was a very dedicated birder at that time, and I wandered in here not knowing what was here,” she says.
When she saw all the birds, she offered to give bird tours at the park. That was the beginning of her love of Lakes Park.
“When they got serious about the botanical garden, I helped plan the Community Garden,” she says. “The Community Garden is one of the most successful of the community gardens in Florida.”
Wearing hot pink pants, a lighter pink sweater and a wide-brimmed hat ribboned with pink flowers and a pink bow, Sue moves confidently around the Children’s Garden. She says being active in the garden has helped keep her healthy. When she had a stroke many years ago and was diagnosed with Parkinson’s, she had to give up flying the small planes she loved to pilot.
“Having an interest has kept me going,” she says. “This is my ministry. God wants this children’s garden to be built, and he wants me to do it, and with his help, it will be done.”
A party for her 80th birthday was held in Lakes Park from on March 30. In lieu of gifts, Sue is asked for donations to the Lakes Park Enrichment Foundation.
“I am hoping to get lots of people to come and to make donations to the gardens,”she says.