Iwas given a treasure – heirloom bean seeds from the Dutch Fork.

My relative called the beans, Dutch Fork Beans passed down for many generations. My grandmother Effie Frick always planted family heirloom white runner string beans, rumored to have come over with the German immigrants in 1752. These are the beans I grew up eating. They are the best.

When mom gives me some for our family, preparing causes me to reminisce.

I think about all those women in my family who did the same thing in times past to prepare them for their children.

It is a family gardening legacy, a connection that transcends time.

Grow or go hungry

Gardening in the old days was done to survive.

If you didn’t grow it, you didn’t have it to eat.

Gardens of the good old days were filled with green beans, squash, cucumbers, carrots, onions, cabbage, pumpkins, watermelons, okra, herbs and large fields of corn and sweet potatoes.

One story I heard from an old timer, was that his dad had such a bumper crop of sweet potatoes; he invited his neighbor to help him gather them in and gave him half of the potatoes.

I met an older gentleman in Rock Hill who mentioned that his farmer father considered a watermelon under 50 pounds not worth selling.

Agricultural historian and author Jim Kibler said that in the late 1700s indigo, rice and flax were planted in the Dutch Fork.

Growing in your backyard garden, you could plant vegetables from all over the world. Bell peppers, squash, sweet potatoes and tomatoes from Central America.

Cucumbers supposedly came from India and green beans from Peru. Ethiopia is thought to be the origin of sugar cane.

Okra made its way from Ethiopia to my garden.

Who doesn’t love the taste of a homegrown tomato?

Did you know that Europeans were terrified of the tomato in the 1700s, and called it a poisoned apple?

Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortes found the tasty tomato while visiting the Aztecs and brought seeds to Europe as an ornamental plant.

Botanist, Joseph Pitton, named the tomato Lycopersicon Esculentum, which means “Wolf Peach” in Latin.

John Parkinson, another botanist, wrote that British gardeners grew them only for “curiosity and beauty of the fruit.”

They missed out on delicious tomato sandwiches.

Whispers of the past

Gardening today is an enjoyable pastime, a summer hobby for many of us.

Our gardening legacy from our ancestors whispers to us from ages past.

Our legacy compels us to play in the dirt and enjoy homegrown vegetables.

Heirloom seeds are a connection with the past that brings forth more seeds, and good food in our present.

I have planted my “Dutch Fork beans” and am excited to give my children the chance to help pick them when they are ripe.

As I grab my hoe and keep the garden weed free, I can see my grandparents shaking their heads and giggling.

As a child, I was the one who hated working in the garden.

I now chuckle as my kids complain about weeding the garden.

When my children plant their gardens with their children, I will be the grandparent laughing,

I want to be there to tell them of the Dutch Fork beans, and Grandma’s white runner bean, to pass on the family gardening legacy.

I call it “gardening justice.”