By: Isaac Linsk, Follow South Jersey Intern
EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, N.J. – A few paces away from the entrance of Reed’s Organic Farm and Animal Sanctuary, Damon Smith is toiling away inside one of the farm’s many greenhouses. He is in the midst of potting plants for the Earth Day celebration and plant sale at the farm.
For the past two years Smith, 52, has been at the helm of a project called Our Gardens aiming to bring communities local and global together through gardening plants from areas of global conflict like Ukraine, Palestine, and Afghanistan to name a few.
In addition to being a gardener, Smith is also a veteran of the first war in Iraq, and in the past few years has dedicated considerable time to cultivating not just plants, but also understanding and empathy between communities through his gardening projects.
The inception for what would eventually become Our Gardens happened back in the late 2010’s when Smith found a seed from a city in Iraq he remembered from his Service.
“This is the first tomato in the collection that was from 2017,” Smith said during a tour of the greenhouse. “It was from the time I got that seed and that’s actually what created gloves on the ground. I remember that there was this little girl that died that was from this town called Basra. I looked down in the description of that seed and it came from her town. So in 2017 I grew it for her and in 2018 I started gloves on the ground.”
Gloves On The Ground developed into Our Gardens a few years into Smith’s horticultural career. A few years after starting Gloves On The Ground, Smith began volunteering at Reed’s Farm in 2020. After the farm had transferred hands to current owner, Margate-based restaurateur Caroline “Cookie” Till.
After a few months of volunteering, Smith pitched his vision of a peace garden growing the conflict seeds he had been collecting over the past few years. Effectively to show people that if these plants could grow next to one another than people can as well.
One of the most novel aspects of the upcoming iteration of Smith’s garden is that the crops will be arranged in a pattern to create a map of sorts. Allowing visitors to get a better sense of where each particular crop comes from.
Smith recounted an anecdote of being visited by an older Chinese man who only communicated with him through the use of Google Translate on his phone. The man had been a farmer in China earlier in his life and had never seen anyone grow a pumpkin native to his region outside of the region before.
During the development of this global project, Smith had an opportunity to honor the people indigenous to South Jersey, the Lenni Lenape Tribe.
“The Lenape grew on this land,” Smith explained. “They were on this land. We found artifacts from them on this land as we’ve been digging. We actually replanted, we’ve reburied all of it in the middle of my garden. So we had found a bunch of stuff throughout that first year. And then in 2021 when we created the garden space, we dug a hole in the center, I guess it’s in the middle of Europe now, and buried it all and then did a ceremony. We were told by the current Lenape chief that that was the way that they would want to see it done. Not that they don’t want them, they don’t want us to give them back, they want us to rebury them into the land to pay respects to their heritage.”
The peace garden serves as more than just a walkthrough exhibit for local South Jersey residents interested in horticulture. It serves to both honor and preserve the agricultural histories of areas involved in violent conflict, in effect a form of food justice. Especially for places like Iraq where things like Order 81 prevented local farmers from harvesting and processing heirloom seeds, making them dependent on seeds from American companies like Monsanto.
For those interested in getting involved with Our Gardens or Reeds Farm, you can visit https://www.ourgardens.org/ for more information.
Reed’s Farm and Animal Sanctuary is located at 5075 Spruce Ave., Egg Harbor Township.
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