Intrepid field-trippers from the Carroll County Master Gardeners braved the downpour on Saturday, September 20, 2025 to tour two great projects, courtesy of the Benton County Master Gardeners.
The first stop was at Helping Hands garden in Bentonville. Here, Benton County MG grow fresh food to distribute at the Helping Hands Food Pantry. Helping Hands is an enormous (and impressive!) project composed of raised beds that are watered by drip irrigation. It’s impossible to get a photo of the whole thing but you can get an idea of how big it is by looking at the graph of the garden layout.
Joanne York, Terry Weiderhaft and John Sparks from Benton County MG greeted us in the hoop house constructed by Benton County MG last year.
The first order of business was to eat the delicious Great Pumpkin dessert Joanne made for the occasion. Fortified, we went on to the tour!
The garden was started in 2016 with a donation of 20 raised beds from Lowe’s. Terry said that, at the beginning, some of the beds had no plants–not even dirt! Since that time, the Benton County Master Gardeners have added scores of raised beds made of wood, cinder block and metal and filled every available space with food and flowers.
Plus, there’s the “Terry Weiderhaft Pavilion,” which started its life as a 3-car garage and has since been reincarnated as a shade and gathering space for garden workers. On the inside of each pillar of the Terry Weiderhaft Pavilion, you’ll see notes about the fig varieties planted for Benton County MG Andrea Klokow’s ongoing fig trial.
More Helping Hands Garden photos below. Click each image to see a larger photo and captions:
Our second stop on the tour was Vera’s Victorian Garden at Hawkins House – Rogers Historical Museum. Benton County MG Marcy Zahm welcomed us to this 2024 Master Gardener Project of the Year!
In 2022, the Rogers Historical Museum and City of Rogers Parks Department partnered with the Benton County Master Gardeners to transform the garden into a Victorian flower garden as an educational extension of the historic 1895 Hawkins House. We were told that we visited at a great time because Hawkins House is soon to undergo foundation renovations and the garden will be affected. (And we can, perhaps, be forgiven for lifting a couple of plant starts under the circumstances?)
Nearly all the plants in Vera’s Victorian Garden are those that would be grown in an actual Victorian garden–with the exception of a few flowers added for showy color at the request of the City.
Hawkins House was set up as “House in Mourning” for spooky season and we were able to tour the exhibit of Victorian mourning customs. One custom that was new to all of us was the “Hair Wreath,” which is an art piece of flowers and scrolls made out of human hair and displayed in a shadow box. We’re sorry we didn’t get a picture of that one. (Or are we?)
