Marie Selby Botanical Gardens recently welcomed Dr. Uzi Baram as Director of Public Archaeology.

In this role, Baram’s focus is the interpretation and representations of the archaeological and cultural histories at Selby Gardens’ two campuses. There is a robust heritage across the region and, significantly, the Historic Spanish Point campus preserves a very ancient monument and evidence of the ancient peoples who lived by Little Sarasota Bay. Baram will manage the archaeological resources and guide educational efforts to better connect people with the region’s history, one of the pillars of Selby Gardens’ mission.

“With the adoption of the Historic Spanish Point campus, we knew that we had to enhance our team to help protect and share the amazing archaeological record there going back 5,000 years,” said Jennifer O. Rominiecki, president and CEO of Selby Gardens. “Uzi is a tremendous addition to the Selby Gardens staff, and his expertise is just what we need to properly manage and increase understanding of the rich archaeological resources of our two campuses and the wider region.”

Awarded the 2019 Archaeological Conservancy Award by the History and Preservation Coalition of Sarasota County, Dr. Baram taught for 25 years at New College of Florida, where he was a professor of anthropology and created and directed New College’s Public Archaeology Laboratory. Baram’s professional career has focused on exposing and documenting local history through community-based projects. Much of his work has concentrated on nearly erased history in Manatee and Sarasota counties.

Baram is best known locally for the community-based effort that revealed the early 19th-century settlement of Angola, a maroon community of people of African heritage along the Manatee River. Other public archaeology projects he has organized include archaeology at Philippi Estate Park, educational programs on the Cuban fishing ranchos of Florida’s Gulf coast, and surveys of the Rosemary and Galilee cemeteries in Sarasota. These projects included field work, research, scientific publications, lectures, tours, documentaries, and educational materials for use in local schools.

Beyond his Florida research, Baram is known for his work in the eastern Mediterranean and for understanding archaeology as heritage. He has published four edited volumes, written dozens of academic articles and book chapters, and lectured extensively on the social significance of heritage.

Baram expects to use the same community-based focus in his work at Selby Gardens. “Uzi brings a wealth of knowledge and a practice of engagement that is essential to understanding and preserving our regional history,” said John McCarthy, Selby Gardens’ vice president for regional history.

Baram earned his master’s and doctorate in Anthropology from University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He received his bachelor’s degree in Anthropology from State University of New York at Binghamton. Baram has lived in Sarasota since 1997, where he raised three children. His family has enjoyed both the Downtown Sarasota and Historic Spanish Point campuses of Selby Gardens for many years.

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If you’ve ever received a box of elegantly wrapped citrus as a gift, you can thank the Webb Family for helping to inspire that pretty-meets-practical packaging. This pioneer family, who lived at the site of Selby Gardens’ Historic Spanish Point campus in the 19th century, used an early version of that technique to ship citrus grown on the family’s Florida farm.

Around 1870, the Webbs built a packing house on the family’s property to box and ship crops grown on-site for sale around the state and country. The Webbs knew they would increase their profits by putting a little effort into packaging their citrus instead of just placing it any which way into a box.

Disastrous first attempts at cushioning it in Spanish moss led to rotten fruit once it reached market. But the Webbs soon shifted to tissue paper wrapping and found it a much better method of protecting the precious produce. The family also made its own shipping crates on-site and marked them with a stencil reading “John G. Webb, Osprey, Florida,” an early version of the colorful labels that came later in time and are associated with Florida citrus today.

The original packing house ceased operations in the early 1900s and no longer exists due to storm damage over the years. But the team at the Historic Spanish Point campus built an exacting replica on the site in 1990, where the original support piles can still be seen. A dock jutting out into Little Sarasota Bay helps visitors imagine how schooners were loaded with produce before setting sail for markets like Key West and Cedar Key.

Today, the reconstructed Packing House features an exhibit display centered around the washing, sorting, and packing of citrus at the site. “But people should really understand that the history is a lot richer than that,” says John McCarthy, vice president of regional history at Selby Gardens.

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While our work has progressed, our 15-acre bayfront property found itself still in need of the infrastructure a botanical garden requires, especially considering future sea level rise to protect our collections. As Selby Gardens moves into the future we envision an improved master site plan that shares with our more than 200,000 visitors each year the important work conducted here. These improvements move our scientific and living collections out of flood zones and into secure structures using the latest green building technology. We are proud that this plan upholds our past and also ensures Selby Gardens’ future, which has significant scientific importance. It also allows us to expand on Marie’s original gift to the community, but envisioned at the highest level.

Phase One of the plan includes the Jean Goldstein Welcome Center & Nathalie McCulloch Library, as well as a Sky Terrace and Preserved Plant Complex.

THE PLAN

While still in early phases, we have a new site plan that

• Increases our green space by 50 percent
• Improves water access for eco-tours
• Improves parking capacity and organizes visitor experience
• Includes a demonstration site for green building technology, such as a large solar energy plant, stormwater collection and reuse, nature based water purification, green walls and roofs and urban food gardening

TIMELINE & COSTS

The timeline of the project is estimated to take 10 years and is dependent on fundraising. Construction of Phase One could begin in the next three to five years. The entire project is estimated to cost $67 million.

PHASES

Phase One:

• Jean Goldstein Welcome Center & Nathalie McCulloch Library
• Preserved Plant Complex
• Sky Terrace and Parking Garden

Phase Two

• Greenhouse complex
• Learning Pavilion

Phase Three

• Continued restoration of historic buildings
• Upgrades to walking paths and other Garden access Points

PARKING & OPERATIONS

Selby Gardens will remain open throughout implementation of the master site plan.

Parking Spaces

• Current Parking at Selby Gardens: 250 and 2 bus parking spots (another 25 cars park alongside Palm Avenue at peak times)
• Parking spaces estimated in new structure: 450

Property vs. Parking

• Percentage of the property currently dedicated to parking: 14.4%, or 92,210 square feet
• Percentage of the property estimated for new structure: 7.8% or 50,000 square feet

Garden Space

• Percentage of the property currently dedicated to garden use: 50%, or 320,750 square feet
• Percentage of the property proposed for garden use: 80%, or 513,200 square feet, not including green roofs and vertical gardens.

THE TEAM

OLIN

Kimley-Horn

Overland Partners

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In addition to co-founding the Friends of the Gardens–Selby Associates, Ann established the Gardens’ tour guide program and wrote the volunteer handbook, “Wonder as You Wander,” that was used for many years to train all guides. She also created a speaker’s bureau to handle requests for our botanists to share the Gardens’ scientific mission. In 2008, then-Director of our Gesneriad Research Center Dr. John R. Clark named a newly-described gesneriad in Ann’s honor.

“Ann was an important leader in Selby Gardens’ history who I admired so much,” said CEO Jennifer O. Rominiecki. “It was my privilege to present her with an award in recognition of her
40 th year as a volunteer in 2016. We will miss her deeply.”

Botany Directory Bruce Holst, who has been acquainted with Ann for more than two decades, noted “A most wonderful friend is gone.”

Ann once commented, “My relationship to the Gardens started as being about the plants and science – and that is still very near and dear to my heart. But it has grown over time to be more about the people, much more about the people.” She was beloved by Gardens staff, volunteers, and members.

Anyone wishing to honor Ann may contribute to the Research Center of Marie Selby Botanical Gardens. To make a donation in her memory, visit this secure webpage, or send a contribution care of Ann Logan to Marie Selby Botanical Gardens, 811 S. Palm Ave., Sarasota, FL 34236.

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Dr. Carl Luer, Dr. Peter Raven, Jennifer O. Rominiecki and Dr. Cal Dodson visited Selby Gardens in January 2017.

Dr. Peter Raven, one of the world’s leading botanists and advocates of conservation and biodiversity, recently spoke with leadership, staff, volunteers and advocates at Selby Gardens. This was Raven’s fourth such visit to Sarasota, having spoken at the formal dedication of the Gardens on April 3, 1976, and again upon the 10th and 25th anniversaries of the institution.

“Selby Gardens has more than lived up to the hopes and dreams we had for the place in 1973,” Raven said. “Anyone who supports this institution should feel very good.”

While here, Raven also reunited with two of the founders of Selby Gardens, Dr. Carl Luer and Dr. Cal Dodson, as well as today’s president and CEO, Jennifer O. Rominiecki.

Raven is president emeritus of Missouri Botanical  Garden, one of the world’s leading botanic gardens, which he led for four decades. He also holds the post of chairman of the Center for Plant Conservation, a national environmental advocacy organization. Raven has been described by Time magazine as a “Hero for the Planet,”  and is the recipient of numerous prizes and awards, including the prestigious International Prize for Biology from the government of Japan and the U.S. National Medal of Science, the country’s highest award for scientific accomplishment.

During his talk beneath the iconic banyan trees planted by Marie Selby nearly 80 years ago, Raven discussed the importance of the work conducted by botanical gardens, and how individuals can personally make changes to positively affect climate change.

“We depend on plants directly or indirectly for everything from food to medicine,” Raven said. “There are still a lot of discoveries to be made from plants.”

Citing expectations for worldwide population growth over the next 30 to 50 years, Raven detailed how human pressure on environments needs to change to continue to sustain life so that, in his view, our species can continue to enjoy the civilized pursuits we enjoy, such as gardens, arts, poetry, philosophy and religion.

“Nobody knows how many people the world can support on a sustainable basis,” Raven said.

He encouraged the audience to research the effects of population growth and opportunities for scientific endeavors that create a sustainable future, in particular the Global Footprint Network, which allows people to calculate their individual impact on the environment. Raven encouraged reducing the consumption of limited resources by recycling, driving less, growing trees and gardening. He thanked the audience for their commitment to the world’s future.

“Let’s use Marie Selby Botanical Gardens as an inspiration. A botanical garden can be a model of sustainability and strengthen people’s understanding of how close we actually are to the natural world,” Raven said. “It’s a place where people and plants come together where we can create a real understanding, inform the citizenry and bring them out to a place where they have time to think.”

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“When an envelope appeared with a return address of Japan on it, I wasn’t sure what to expect,” said Jennifer O. Rominiecki, president and CEO of Selby Gardens. “Inside though, was the most amazing letter and photos from a monk at a Buddhist temple.”

In the letter we learned about a young woman from Japan, Mami Teramura, who had visited Selby Gardens recently while on a break from studying at the University of Michigan. She found the bell near the koi pond and read the name of the temple and the address on the surface of the bell and discovered it was from her home town. When Mami returned to Japan, she told her father about the bell, who happened to know the monk’s son through business.

The letter from the 80-year- old Mr. Takumyo Anjiki went on to tell the history of the bell, which was previously unknown at the Gardens. The 117-year- old bell is called a Kansho, and it is rung at the opening of Buddhist temple ceremonies. The bell was taken from the temple by the Japanese government during World War II to be melted down to create weapons. Thankfully, the bell wasn’t ever melted, and was returned to the temple, but Mr. Anjiki says that the bell started to make strange sounds when it was hit after being returned, so the temple replaced it and kept the old bell in storage. It remained there until an antiques dealer visited the temple and purchased the bell. In 2010, Selby Gardens purchased the bell online, bringing it to Sarasota.

“I was so moved by Mr. Anjiki’s story,” Rominiecki said. “He closes his letter by calling the rediscovery of the temple’s bell a miracle and he views the bell as a symbol of peace between our two countries. He calls this link between his temple and the Gardens part of a destined thread called “Goen,”” and writes that “goen” is one of the most valuable things in the lives of Buddhist monks.”

Guests at the Gardens are invited to ring the bell from the Kakujo-ji Temple during your visits, as well as explore the grounds to find other unique pieces of art.

We look forward to seeing you in the Gardens!

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Like most non-profit organizations, Selby Gardens has long relied on donors and volunteers to help achieve its goals. Libby Besse was a volunteer powerhouse at Selby Gardens in the 1970s and 80s, helping to take care of our collections here at the Gardens as well as serving as a member of our board of trustees. Not only did she help to fund many of our plant collecting expeditions at the time, but she participated in the trips, aiding immensely with work in the field. In fact, Libby Besse was behind one of the most fabulous orchid discoveries of the twentieth century.

Phragmipediums, also known as “lady slipper orchids,” grow in cooler tropical areas, usually in high elevation. They typically bloom purplish-pink to white. In 1981, while plant collecting in Peru with Selby Gardens staff members Joe Halton and Harry Luther, Libby Besse collected some Phragmipediums out of bloom on the road from Tarpato to Yurimaguas. She took photos, pressed some plants for herbaria, and also took some live plants back to Selby to grow. At the time, Bessee and the others assumed that this was the first recorded collection east of the Andes Mountains of Phragmipedium climii, a lady slipper with typical flowers.

So, it was a complete shock to everyone involved when the orchid later flowered at the Gardens. The deep red color of the bloom is totally unique for this genus, and no one had ever seen anything like it before. Selby’s Calaway Dodson and Janet Kuhn described the new species in the 1981 American Orchid Society bulletin, naming it Phragmipedium besseae after its discoverer.
Libby Besse still lives on the beautiful Siesta Key estate she and her husband, Byron, shared for decades.

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Marie Selby was an avid gardener who was passionate about roses. How then did Selby Gardens become a world-renowned center for orchid research? It’s due largely to the efforts of Dr. Carlyle Luer, a Sarasota-area surgeon who counted Mrs. Selby as one of his patients.

Orchidology had been a lifelong pursuit for the doctor, who would go on to become the undisputed experts on the group of miniature orchids known as the “pleurothallids.” It was Luer’s vision, along with consultation with the New York Botanical Garden and University of Florida, and the backing of William Coleman of Palmer Bank, Mrs. Selby’s executor that would turn the Selby property into a true botanical garden. The gardens would focus on orchids and other epiphytes, Luer explained, which are small plants, and allow a unique collection to be housed on less than a dozen acres.

Dr. Luer didn’t just want a world-class plant collection, however, he wanted a world-class staff as well. So he and Mr. Coleman travelled to Ecuador to ask a leading orchid researcher, Dr. Calaway Dodson, to come to Florida to serve as the first director of the botanical gardens. Cal agreed, and thus began a decades-long friendship and collecting partnership; a legacy resulting in dozens of collecting trips to the American tropics; thousands of new specimens brought back for the Gardens’ collection; and a litany of new species described for science, such as the Maxillaria lueri described by Dodson and named in Luer’s honor in 1980.

Dr. Luer continues his work with orchids today, working closely with the Gardens’ current orchid specialist, Dr. Toscano DeBrito. Together they are focusing, appropriately enough, on the large group of small orchids, pleurothallids.

We hope you enjoyed the history of some of the people behind the plants here at Selby Gardens. To explore more about our past, stop in for a tour. We look forward to seeing you in the Gardens.

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