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Windows and an open floor plan give a home a light, airy feel

Midnight turns cubs into grizzlies Midnight has always held a certain mystique. It is the forbidden fruit of the life clock. From fairy tales to monster movies, it is the bewitching hour when things happen. Interesting things. Carriages turn back into pumpkins, mild mannered men sprout hair as they transform into werewolves and the streets turn to orgies of violence and mayhem while the rivers run red with blood. Well, that is what I always imagined. As you get older, midnight is just the opposite of noon. When you are awake to see midnight in your 40s, it just means you will be tired tomorrow. Ah, but midnight for the young is awesome. It begins as the goal of all adolescent sleepovers. The plan includes movies, popcorn, sleeping bags and staying up until midnight. It is a mini New Year’s Eve in footie pajamas. As one enters her teens, midnight at home becomes rather pedestrian. The true thrill of midnight is being out and about among the creatures of the night. Besides the usual theme park visits and middle-of-the-night trips to Wal-Mart, my daughters and I haven’t done a lot of midnight outings. That is what made last weekend so special. I decided to take the girls to a midnight movie. But our first midnight movie wasn’t just a trip to the safe and sound theaters of San Antonio. I decided to take them to a theater on Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, Calif. At midnight. If you are going to be a bear, be a grizzly. Knowing we would be in California when the Disney/Pixar movie “Cars” opened, I sort of promised the girls we would see it at the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood. I sort of promised we could go opening day. I sort of do things like that without thinking it through. I didn’t think about it being sold out. Sold out it was. El Capitan Theater was the jewel of Hollywood Boulevard back when it opened on May 3, 1926, as “Hollywood’s First Home of Spoken Drama.” Clark Gable and Joan Fontaine appeared in plays there. In 1941, Orson Welles premiered “Citizen Kane” there. The theater, as well as the boulevard, is steeped in history. Hollywood Boulevard has a reputation for being interesting. Despite Disney’s presence and the Kodak Theater’s arrival, it still has a “Pretty Woman” aspect to it. But a promise is a promise. Since every showing of “Cars” was sold out except the midnight showing, I bought

PHOTOS BY WILLIAM LUTHER/STAFF

MICHAEL O’ROURKE

BY TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN EXPRESS-NEWS HOME & GARDEN EDITOR

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ike everyone these days, John Kight is looking for rain. Like the rest of us, he wants relief from the miserable heat and drought. But Kight has another interest, perhaps a more significant one: He made a vow to his wife. “He promised me I would always have water,” says Mary Evelyn Kight. Unlike most folks, the Kights rely solely on rain for their water needs. Every drop of water for drinking, cooking, bathing, cleaning and lawn irrigation at their house north of Boerne A three-person comes via household would use the clouds. about 99 gallons of And even water a day indoors with the and 45 outdoors. The daily rundown and dry spell the household total: that’s lingered since Faucets: 5 minutes December per person, 1.5 gal2004, the lons a minute. Total: Kights 22.5 gallons. aren’t conShowers: 5 minutes cerned per person, 2 gallons about being a minute. Total: 30 parched. gallons. The big Toilets: 6 flushes per green tanks person, 2 gallons per out back flush. Total: 36 galstill hold lons. about 21,000 Washing machine: 3 gallons of loads per week, 16 water, gallons per load. Toroughly tal: 48 gallons a two-thirds week. (That’s based of the on a front-loading 30,000-gallon washing machine; capacity, top-loading machines captured use about 40 gallons from roofper load.) top runoff. Dishwasher: 4 loads Even withper week, 8 gallons out a drop per load. Total: 32 of rain, gallons a week. Kight figSource: John Kight ures that amount would keep the faucets flowing for the better part of a year without any lawn watering. “With 2 to 3 inches of rain, we’ll be full again,” he says.

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A glass of water from John Kight’s 30,000-gallon rainwater-collection system is crystal clear. In the top photo, Kight stands next to one of the tanks that store the water at the home near Boerne he shares with his wife, Mary Evelyn. John Kight designed the system.

Ikebana students look at spaces as well as stems LADY BIRD JOHNSON WILDFLOWER CENTER

Japanese-style arrangements, as taught in museum class, stress natural, seasonal materials.

Zexmenia

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he Japanese word for it is moribana. Directly translated, it means heap of flowers. That’s not a very poetic way to describe artful flower arrangements that emphasize the spaces between the stems as much as the materials used. As Don Olsen teaches about moribana and other forms of ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arranging, he weaves in lessons in the language. The spiked floral frog that holds the stems is a kenzan, meaning “sword mountain.” He prefers the Japanese term to the less-graceful English names.

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Student Alicia Leff learned about Japanese culture from her parents, who fell in love with it while living in California. When Leff’s mother died 18 years ago, she left a box of ikebana supplies. Her mother would talk about the Japanese genius for revealing beauty and simplicity, discussions that stayed with Leff. “I have always wanted to do this very specific thing,” she says. On a recent Saturday, Leff attended her first ikebana class along with 16 other students at the San Antonio Museum of Art. Three more classes will be offered — June 24 and July 8 and 22 — and will cover a variety of arSee ARRANGEMENTS/5E

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Heather Snow carefully trims the cedar elm branches in an arrangement she’s making during an ikebana class taught by Don Olsen at the San Antonio Museum of Art.

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(Wedelia hispida) Tough times call for tough plants, and zexmenia proves it’s a survivor by blooming in the current blistering conditions. The evergreen perennial produces yellow daisylike flowers that measure about an inch across. In full sun, the plant grows upright and takes the form of a small shrub. With some shade, it tends to stretch and sprawl as a ground cover. Foliage has a rough texture and can irritate the skin. ■ Light: Sun to part sun. ■ Size: 2 to 3 feet tall; 2 feet wide. ■ Water: Drought tolerant. ■ Bloom: May through October. ■ Cultivation: Shear the plant back in midsummer to keep it in good form. Needs good drainage but adapts to a variety of soils.

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Rainfall collectors have good water, and lots of it CONTINUED FROM 1E

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Kight, 71, designed and installed the rainwater collection system for the hilltop home he and Mary Evelyn moved into in August 2002. They lived in the finished-out garage for a year as their 3,500-square-foot house was being built. All the while, they’ve relied on rain, with no backup water supply. In planning the system, the retired engineer pored over climate data and studied his household water use. His meticulous records show daily water use indoors of a fairly steady 70 gallons per day. Factor in last year’s landscape watering, and the number more than doubles to an annualized average of 146 gallons a day. Kight looked at annual rainfall in Boerne, which averages about 36 inches a year, and at the drought of record — in the 1950s — in which there was no rain for 100 days. From his standing-seam metal roof, which covers 6,400 square feet, he can collect 4,000 gallons of water from every inch of rain. Crunching all those numbers, and padding the days without rain to 120, he arrived at the 30,000-gallon storage capacity. “I always want to be a little bit conservative,” he says. Now he’s adding three 1,550-gallon tanks because, he says, Mary Evelyn sees water being lost in heavy rains. Like the Kights, more people in the Hill Country are going back to the water-supply systems of our forefathers. Weighing the cost — and risk — of drilling a well against the cost of a rainwaterharvesting system was a factor for Kight. “The aquifers in the Hill Country definitely have sweet spots, but there’s a risk of not getting water,” says Chris Brown, a San Antonio-based water conservation consultant and principal coauthor of the third edition of the “Texas Manual on Rainwater Harvesting,” a publication of the Texas Water Development Board. Unlike previous versions of the manual, which focused mainly on using rainwater collection for landscape watering, the updated manual, released in spring 2005, devotes more attention to capturing potable water. Brown estimates the cost of a whole-house rainwater collection system around $15,000, in line with what Kight spent on his system. Prices vary according to the size and material of the cisterns. At Bohnert Lumber Co. in Comfort, a 2,500-gallon polypropylene tank costs $800, says Steve Bohnert. Eight of the tanks would collect 20,000 gallons of water at $6,400. “A well is going to cost you three times that amount now,” Bohnert says. Wood and metal tanks cost more, but Bohnert says he has seen homeowners disguise poly tanks by wrapping them with cedar stays or galvanized metal. Polyethylene tanks that hold 3,000 gallons cost $1,000 each at Golden Eagle Landscape in Ingram, a company that sells equipment and installs rainwater-harvesting systems. The biggest cost variable in installation is in building a pad for the tanks, says

SEMINAR AND TOUR What: John Kight will discuss rainwater collection in a seminar sponsored by Cibolo Nature Center. Participants can see Kight’s system firsthand. When: 9 a.m.-noon June 24. Where: Meet at Cibolo Nature Center parking lot, 140 City Park Road, off Texas 46 East, Boerne. Car-pool to Kight residence. Cost: Members, $15; couples $20. Nonmembers, $20, couples $25. Reservations: Limited to 30 people. Call (830) 249-4616.

ON THE WEB American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association www.arcsa-usa.org Group founded in Austin in 1994 to promote rainwater catchment in the U.S. Site includes links to suppliers of materials for rainwater collection systems. PHOTOS BY WILLIAM LUTHER/STAFF

ABOVE: Raúl and Sandy Peña are almost dwarfed by the tanks that hold the rainwater they collect at their western Kerr County home. Their system, like the Kights’, provides all their water. LEFT: John Kight shows the UV filter (at right) that destroys bacteria in the collected water, which is well-filtered first.

landscape designer Katherine Crawford. Digging into a hillside, building a retaining wall and backfilling it will drive up the cost, she notes. Required filters don’t add significantly to the cost, but homeowners do need to have sufficient rooftop areas, gutters and downspouts. Some rainwater harvesters elect to build “rain barns,” shedlike structures that conceal tanks and provide collection area for rain runoff. When Sandy and Raúl Peña explored water options for their property near Center Point nine years ago, they got a $12,000 estimate for a well. Like the Kights, they opted for rainwater collection and have installed four 3,000gallon cisterns in the basement of the home they are building. “It makes so much sense to use the rain,” says Sandy Peña. “It’s free, and we’re not punching another hole in the aquifer.” The Peñas’ tanks filled to their 12,000-gallon capacity with 10 inches of rain more than a year ago, and the Peñas have used only small amounts of the water in mixing mortar for the house. Now, they rely on tanks that capture 6,500 gallons of water from their work-

shop and the 12-by-16-foot cabin they live in. Both the Peñas and the Kights note the high quality of their water. “By the time we actually drink our water, it’s almost the quality of water used for kidney dialysis,” says Sandy Peña, who resigned from her job as administrator of the department of human and molecular genetics at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston when she and her husband moved to western Kerr County in 1996. Raúl Peña retired as a software developer for Shell Oil and has designed the rainwa-

ter-collection systems they use. “When friends come over, the first thing they want to do is have a drink of our water,” she says. Mary Evelyn Kight says they didn’t use water from their system until it was analyzed in Kerrville. Now, John Kight refers to records from twice-a-year testing. The water is soft — but a different soft, because soap rinses off easily, the Kights note — and it measures 5 on total dissolved solids. Environmental Protection Agency standards cap total dissolved solids at 1,000 in public water supplies. “That’s about as close to noth-

ing as you’re going to get,” says John Kight. In each of the systems, water from gutters passes first through a roof washer that filters out dust, leaves, blooms and bird droppings. Kight uses a sock filter made of double-weave shade cloth primarily to catch oak blooms. “You do not want organic material in the storage tanks,” he says. “It sours the water.” From the cisterns, the Kights’ potable water goes through a series of three filters. A 5-micron cloth filter catches the first particles, then the water passes through a 3-micron charcoal filter. “Remember, a hair is 30 microns,” Kight notes. From there, it goes through a UV filter to zap any bacteria. The result is crystal-clear water that doesn’t leave sediment on fixtures — all thanks to the rain. “All you have to do is collect enough water in rainy times to get you through about three months without rain,” Sandy Peña says. “We have a year’s supply of water.” Brown notes a weather adage that applies to the Hill Country: “Our climate can be adequately described as drought punctuated by flood.” He adds, “Rain may come infrequently in Central Texas, but it does come.” Still, rainwater harvesters such as the Peñas and Kights must use water frugally. “If you’re going to use rainwater, you have to buy into the conservation lifestyle,” says Brown.

Texas Water Development Board www.twdb.state.tx.us Download the agency’s 88-page handbook that covers system configuration, water quality and treatment. Web site features a calculator to help property owners design a system. Texas Cooperative Extension http://rainwaterharvesting. tamu.edu Site explains the development of a system to collect rainwater for irrigating the landscape. The Kights have a front-loading washer, which uses about 16 gallons per load compared with more than 40 gallons for a standard top-loading model. Still, notes Mary Evelyn Kight with a smile, “he lets me take one long shower a week.” They also used drought-tolerant Sahara Bermuda grass in their landscape and put down about 8 inches of topsoil over the solid rock so the grass could establish a deeper root system. Mary Evelyn Kight irrigates only the small front yard, and only when it’s stressed. The grass is deep green in the front, and she’s run the sprinklers only twice this year. She will water more frequently — and take two long showers a week — when the new tanks are filled. And her husband is keeping his promise of a lasting water supply. [email protected]

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SATURDAY MAY 21, 2005 SECTION E

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In praise of normal August 1976 was the summer of the bicentennial, the “Summer of Sam” and the summer I got screwed on my summer vacation. Almost 30 years later I’m still bitter. “What do you mean school starts in mid-August?” I can still hear myself asking. Moving to Texas from California that summer was traumatic enough on my 12-year-old psyche, but the loss of cherished summer vacation seemed almost too much to bear. August? August is still summer everywhere else. Why isn’t August summer here? It is a question that has bothered me ever since. Kids getting on school buses in 100 degree heat is abusive. When you see Jerry Lewis on television for 24 hours straight you should be preparing for school to start, not already burned out by it. Lo and behold, on the 30th anniversary of my worst summer ever, injustice may finally be righted. It looks like a bill poised to become a law will require Texas schools to begin on the Tuesday after Labor Day and end by June 7th. Yes! The new, normal school year has people deeply divided. The pro-normal people say it will save money on electricity, help tourism and give families more summer time together. The antinormal (pro-abnormal) people claim the longer summer takes away local control, will force older students to take finals after Christmas break and may impede TAKS test preparedness. (It always comes down to the TAKS test doesn’t it?) Bottom line: Students will still have to go to school for 180 days and they will still spend a disproportionate amount of their lives preparing for the TAKS test. They will lose a few days of schooltime breaks, but that is worth a longer summer. What will be different is

MICHAEL O’ROURKE

A birthday crop of abundant beauty Years, like shears, shape a garden. Weeks introduce fresh buds, new leaves.

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Months coax roots to settle into the soil. Seasons instill maturity and character. Decades plant delights.

G OOD TO G ROW

Time is Mother Nature’s tool. As the San Antonio Botanical Garden celebrates its 25th anniversary, we explore delights that have sprung up in a quartercentury of growing and evolving. The 33-acre center yields a bountiful crop of surprises. Turn to Page 12E for the 25 we plucked.

STORY BY TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN P H O T O S B Y L I S A K R A N T Z A N D H E L E N L . M O N T O YA

TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN

Prickly pear (Optunia spp.) With potentially vicious spines, prickly pears aren’t invited into too many residential landscapes. But the sunny yellow blossoms dotting the cactus pads in pastures this time of year make the plant tempting. Just opt for a spineless variety unless you are using the plant as part of your security system. In 1995, Texas lawmakers named prickly pear the state plant, making the Lone Star State the only state with an official plant. The light green color of the pads and their sculptural shape make the plant an asset in the garden. ■ Light: Sun. ■ Size: 2 to 5 feet tall; 4 to 6 feet wide. ■ Water: Drought tolerant. ■ Bloom: Spring. ■ Cultivation: Needs good drainage.

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Digging up delights In a garden, any day can be a surprise party. Look closely among the leaves, along the paths and little quirks reveal themselves. In honor of the 25th anniversary of the San Antonio Botanical Garden, we poked around the 33 acres and harvested a delight for each year. Horticulturist Paul Cox, who’s been at the garden from the construction phase and is now the top guy there, and Candace Andrews, managing director of the San Antonio Botanical Society, shared insights in the search. Here’s what we found, starting at the entrance and circling through the grounds counterclockwise.

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There’s a trick to finding the best placement for art collections, as Geri Davis (left) and Jennifer Campbell of Columbus, Ga., know.

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Tips keep collections from looking cluttered BY MARY BETH BRECKENRIDGE

Pot man The terra cotta guy’s ready for summer in his flip-flops, but don’t be surprised to see him decked out for football season or showing Spurs spirit. Wisteria arbor Perfect for ‘I do’s,’ especially when it’s dripping with fragrant purple blooms in spring.

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Hoja santa Amid the many textures and scents of the Garden for the Blind is the hoja santa. Tear off a bit of a large heart-shaped leaf and take a whiff of the root beer fragrance. Free pass The San Antonio Garden Center picks up the admission tab for blind guests. Turtle rock The stone turtle, really a cluster of stones, looks as if he’s climbing out of the pond in Kumamoto En. Ants in the plants Tucked among the exotic plants in the Exhibition Room of the conservatory are plants that play host to ants, some of them quite aggressive defenders of the flora. Don’t worry. Only the plants are on display.

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The Lucile Halsell Conservatory soars above the Botanical Garden.

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Ducky The fowl at the East Texas Lake appreciate handouts. Birders appreciate the variety of waterfowl and other birds throughout the gardens. Sit a spell The inviting porch on the East Texas Log Cabin overlooks the lake. Madrone A lone madrone survived floods in 1987 that claimed others. The hardy native specimen is starting to bloom. Schumacher House The recently refurbished cottage, originally built in Fredericksburg in 1849, shows the evolution of German building styles. Mini ’scapes A stroll down Watersaver Lane gives a glimpse at a half-dozen landscape styles that illustrate the diverse possibilities with plants suited to the area. Take a close look at the recycled glass walkway in the cottage garden. What sparkle.

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Bubbling over The symbol-stuffed fountain in the Sacred Garden is carved from the same Oaxacan granite as the head of the plaza fountain and the large planters lining the plaza. Bubba From a sapling rescued from the Sunken Gardens grew ‘Bubba,’ a maroon-flowering desert willow. The variety is now the top-selling desert willow.

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there will be cake for the silver anniversary. The celebration runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and Sunday at the garden, 555 Funston Place. Admission costs $8 for adults,

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Making magic Toiling behind the scenes in greenhouses and trial gardens is Ying Doon Moy, the brilliant research horticulturist behind a number of papayas, gingers, roses and hibiscuses bred for South Texas.

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— Tracy Hobson Lehmann PHOTOS BY DOUG SEHRES, LISA KRANTZ AND HELEN L. MONTOYA/STAFF

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Cake, music to mark Botanical Garden’s birthday A birthday bash spread over two days and more than 30 acres is quite a party. And Viva Botanica is quite a party. The festival this year marks the 25th anniversary of the San Antonio Botanical Garden. Yes,

Displaying a collection of family photographs on your walls honors your heritage while adding warmth to your home. However, what’s intended as an infusion of personality can end up a mess if it’s not arranged artfully, said Karen Thompson, a design expert with Home Depot. The first step to an effective arrangement is choosing a spot where the photos won’t be subjected to damage. Avoid direct sunlight, heat sources and areas with high humidity, such as bathrooms, Thompson said. Next, choose frames and mats that will enhance the photos and make the collection cohesive. Thompson recommended sticking with a limited selection of similar frames, especially if you’re displaying both color and black-and-white photos. If you can’t afford new frames, paint old ones to make them coordinate. She also recommended using wide mats in a neutral cream color. Now comes the creative part: arranging. Thompson suggested

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Going batty Formerly on top of the hill, the gazebo is patterned after a bat house because the city used to be an epicenter of the bat population.

making a trial grouping on the wall using photocopies of the pictures in their frames and attaching them with low-tack painter’s tape. It’s helpful to mark off a perimeter as a guide and to treat the entire arrangement as one large piece of art, she said. Aim for overall symmetry, she advised, but remember that a little asymmetry adds interest. Try to keep the distance between frames relatively consistent and the pictures no more than a few inches apart. Make sure the arrangement is at or near the eye level from which it will be viewed most of the time. Artwork should be hung lower in an area such as a dining room where people usually are seated, and higher in an area such as a hallway where they’re usually standing. When you’re satisfied with the arrangement, mark the wall at the middle of the top edge of the photocopies while they’re still on the wall. Measure the distance between the top of the frame and the hanging mechanism, either a hook or taut wire. Hang the pictures securely using appropriate hardware.

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Alien flora With its long straplike leaves, the Welwitschia in the Helen Kleberg Desert Pavilion looks like something from another planet. The plant, native to the Namib Desert, baffles even the botanists who try to classify it. Giant seed It doesn’t take an adolescent to see the monkey butt in the giant seed in the Palm and Cycad House, but kids do love the spectacle. From the 25-pound seed sprouts a coco de mer. Bird’s eye view Follow the winding path through the palm house to a catwalk that gives a peek at the treetops. The idea for the walkway came from the botanic garden conservatory in Paris. King of the jungle The 8-foot-long fronds on the angiopteris — or king fern — make it hard to miss. And it’s still growing. This Australia native is primitive among primitive ferns. Right stuffing The spiny trunk on the kapok tree in the conservatory courtyard conceals the plant’s softer side. Kapok seeds yield cottonlike fiber that is used to stuff everything from pillows to life vests. High point The overlook, the highest point inside Loop 410, offers beautiful panoramas of the city. Water works Remnants of George Brackenridge’s water supply system from the late 1800s remain on the hill. The wall of the former holding tank now borders the amphitheater. Little sprouts Youngsters spend Saturday mornings tending vegetable plots under the tutelage of experienced gardeners. A bonus: They eat their veggies.

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Clockwise from top right: Turtle rock in Kumamoto En Garden; cupola on the Sullivan Carriage House; kapok tree in the Lucile Halsell Conservatory; a mallow hibiscus; the seed of the coco de mer, aka monkey butt; a jasmine-shrouded arbor shades the entrance to a cottage on Watersaver Lane; fence bordering the Japanese garden.

Sullivan Carriage House Designed by architect Alfred Giles and built in 1896, the carriage house was moved stone by stone to the gardens in 1987. Now, visitors enter through the former coach house and stables. Guests can dine in the former horse stalls of the Carriage House Kitchen.

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SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS

Mementos gathered from a life abroad fit perfectly in a Mahncke Park home

SATURDAY OCTOBER 20, 2007 SECTION E

PAGE 10E

Radio is the most personal medium For some of you, it might be Ricci Ware, Judd Ashmore or Bruce Hathaway. For others it might have been Randy Carroll, Drex or Rio & Reyes. For my little brother, it was Winston & Alyce. For my little sister, it was Sonny Melendrez. For my daughter it is Dave E. Rios. For me, I can’t tell you how many tardy slips I received in high school because I stayed in my car to see what John Lisle and Steve Hahn were going to say next. We all have that one radio personality we identify with most. Some of us have more than one. We feel like we know them personally because they are the first voices we hear when the clock-radio alarm goes off. We feel like we know them because their voices fill the kitchen, emanating from the tiny pocket radio that sits on the windowsill, as we eat breakfast and pack a lunch. They are already in the car when you turn the key to accompany you to work with “traffic and weather together on the (insert single digit here).” When they are hitting it out of the park and firing on all cylinders they are the voices that keep you in your car a few extra minutes before going into school or work. You can tell when someone is spending some quality time with his or her radio friends. The seatbelt is off, the backpack, briefcase or purse is in the lap and the right hand on the key about to shut off the engine. But he can’t. The listener is waiting until whatever is transpiring on the radio completes. He is waiting for the revelation, waiting for the punch line or waiting for the answer to the trivia question he just knows he should have known and will slap his forehead when he hears it. When I worked in radio, I tried to explain that to management. The “about-to-turnthe-key-but-can’t” moment is what all personality radio should strive for. Management doesn’t get it. Of all the media in which I have worked, radio management remains the most clueless about the product it produces. Managers don’t understand their listeners, they don’t understand their on-air personalities and they don’t understand the emotion of radio. There is a reason most station managers come from the sales department. I love radio. The same could be said for every San Antonio radio guy mentioned above. The reason the names resonate in our collective souls is because they are the tops of their game. They “get” radio. They “get” their listeners. With all the advances in

MICHAEL O’ROURKE

A guide to living greener ‘Worldchanging’ has tips, innovations for eco-friendly choices. D BY CLAIRE WHITCOMB UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE

I

TOSS IT IN GREEN (NITROGEN) ■ Vegetable and fruit peelings and scraps ■ Coffee grounds ■ Tea bags ■ Fresh-cut grass ■ Plant cuttings ■ Egg shells ■ Horse or chicken manure BROWN (CARBON) ■ Leaves ■ Twigs, wood chips ■ Dried grass ■ Straw, hay ■ Stale bread ■ Coffee filters CUT IT UP Chop or shred larger items such as corn cobs, melon rinds, leaves and sticks. LEAVE IT OUT ■ Fats or oils ■ Meat, fish, bones ■ Pet waste (dog, cat, pig, reptile) ■ Ashes ■ Weeds that have gone to seed ■ Diseased plants

USE IT Compost can be finished in as little as six weeks if the pile is turned frequently and the mix of ingredients is ideal. Typically it takes about six months to ‘cook.’ Where to apply? AROUND SHRUBS, TREES Spread compost around shrubs, perennials and trees to nourish their roots. ON THE LAWN Top dress the lawn with a thin layer of compost and watch the grass green up. IN THE GARDEN Work compost into the soil in flower beds and the vegetable garden in spring or fall.

THE BIN BUILD IT ■ Make a square bin from discarded pallets or a round container from wire mesh or chicken wire. ■ Ideal size is 1 cubic yard, 3 by 3 by 3 feet. BUY IT ■ Choose from tumblers, twin bins or simple wire containers. PLACE IT ■ Choose a location that’s convenient for adding waste. ■ Site should drain well.

What some might see as a rotting trash pile, gardeners view as a heap of treasure. Refuse from the kitchen and lawn holds riches for the soil. So pile it up, let it break down, then dig in. — Tracy Hobson Lehmann

Keyword: Gardening

More about composting

BUILD IT LAYER ■ Alternate layers of brown and green materials. ■ Keep the ratio at 2 parts brown to 1 part green. ■ Water each layer to keep the pile consistently moist. ■ Toss in a couple of scoops of compost or soil to jump-start the microbes. STIR Mix with a pitchfork or compost turner to add air to the pile and speed the process. WATER ■ Compost should feel like a wrung-out sponge: damp, not drippy, not dry.

TROUBLESHOOTING The compost pile will heat to about 140 degrees in the decomposition process, resulting in a product with a rich, earthy aroma. If the mix of ingredients is out of balance, the microbes won’t be able to break down the materials efficiently, and it might give off a foul odor or attract pests. IT STINKS Foul smell: Could be too wet or lacking oxygen. Add dry material and mix well. Ammonia odor: Likely caused by adding too many grass clippings, which form a dense mat. Add carbon to the pile and mix it up. PESTS Fruit flies: If the pests are attracted to your kitchen pail, make sure it has a tightfitting lid and empty it frequently. In the bin, cover kitchen scraps with a thin layer of leaves or soil. Fire ants: Pile could be too dry. Keep moist, and make sure it has the proper mix of materials to heat sufficiently. Varmints: Raccoons, skunks and other critters might come looking for a meal. To discourage them: ■ Bury kitchen scraps in the middle of the pile. ■ Avoid food with fat, meat or dairy. ■ Keep the door secured.

GOOD TO G R OW

Philippine violet

MYSA.COM Green, with envy? South Texas gardeners practice their hobby under difficult conditions: the weather’s either too dry or too wet; the heat takes its toll, then freezes come. And there’s the soil or lack thereof. Those folks with four distinct seasons and rich soil have it made. This week’s question:

Keyword: Gardening

See HOME/12E

TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN

See O’ROURKE/11E

If you could garden anywhere else, where would it be?

t’s a brave green world out there. Every day, someone is inventing something for the home. Like showers that recycle the water you use, the brainchild of a London design student. Or Herman Miller’s upholstered Mirra desk chair, which is chic, ergonomic and 96 percent recyclable. Or Vetrazzo’s eco-countertops, made with ceramic aggregate and recycled glass. This sort of good news, along with global innovations and a sprinkling of very solid ecotips, has been gathered into “Worldchanging: A User’s Guide for the 21st Century” (Abrams, $37.50). Edited by Alex Steffen, co-founder of the Web site WorldChanging.com, the book is billed as a “Whole Earth Catalog” for a new generation. Indeed it is. With a preface by Al Gore, “Worldchanging” is quirky, fun and full of surprises, even for seasoned ecoreaders. Flip through and you can learn how to make iPod speakers out of Altoid tins. You’ll also be reminded that dimmers, automatic timers and motion-detection sensors are among the top five things you can do to conserve energy. “Worldchanging” introduces you to permeable pavement that allows plants and grass to grow through it. And it reminds you that a low-flow showerhead — the fixture that mixes air with water and miraculously produces a strong spray — is a really good idea. Indeed, Americans could save 5.4 billion gallons of water per day simply by installing lowflow fixtures and toilets. If you want to join those who would rather make it themselves than buy conventional products, “Worldchanging” directs you to

ABOVE PHOTO, COURTESY ‘COMPOST’ BY KEN THOMPSON (DK PUBLISHING; $18); TOP PHOTO BY AKEYA DICKSON/WASHINGTON POST. SOURCES: ORGANIC GARDENING, EARTHMACHINE.COM, TEXAS COOPERATIVE EXTENSION

(Barleria cristata) The trumpet-shaped purple flowers on the Philippine violet are attention-grabbers. They are about 2 inches long, and they bloom in abundance this time of year. Set against the deep green foliage of the root-hardy perennial shrub, the flowers stand out from their shady spots in the landscape. The plant likes tropical conditions and will freeze back in harsh winters. Trim back to the ground, and it will sprout from the roots in spring. The common name of Philippine violet is a bit of a mystery, as it originates in India and Myanmar, and it’s not part of the violet family. Plant in a perennial bed, and give it plenty of space. ■ Light: Part shade to part sun. ■ Size: 4 to 5 feet tall; 3 feet wide. ■ Water: Moderate. ■ Bloom: Late summer through fall. ■ Cultivation: Mulch to protect roots in winter.

10E

SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS

D

SATURDAY, APRIL 7, 2007

SPACES

PHOTOS BY GLORIA FERNIZ/STAFF

A settee and two Windsor chairs provide seating around a tilt-top chair table in the dining area of Harriette Gorman’s home in Comfort. The house will be part of a tour April 14.

Antiques collector rescues former armadillo farm from ruin, fills it with treasures

PLACE OF HISTORY BY TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN EXPRESS-NEWS HOME & GARDEN EDITOR

C

OMFORT — At 82, Harriette Gorman is one of the youngest things in her house. Heck, she has tallow candles that qualified as antiques

when she was born in 1925. And by then, some of her chairs exceeded the definition of antique by a century. “To me, a true antique is at least 100 years old,” says Gorman, who two months ago moved into a German farmhouse that itself qualifies as an antique. Completed in 1898, the two-story house behind a wattle fence has a history fittingly rich for the owner’s collection of collections.

ABOVE: In the living room, Queen Anne sconces hang beside a primitive painting of a trio of girls huddled under an umbrella. The painting is above a huntboard set with a collection of stone fruit. RIGHT: A portrait of George Washington presides over the library, a room especially rich in history.

She purchased the property, formerly an armadillo farm, just outside Comfort six years ago. Then, the porch and balcony that grace the front

Harriette Gorman treasures a portrait of Thomas Jefferson that hangs in the library.

of the house were crumbling, but what Gorman describes as the deplorable condition of the structure didn’t deter her. “I moved out here to get another challenge,” says Gorman, no novice at renovation as she faced seven deteriorating buildings on the five

Keyword: SALife For more photos of Harriette Gorman’s home and a look at past Spaces features

See LIFETIME/11E

H OUS E R ULE S Hidden treasures History abounds in the furnishings of Harriette Gorman’s house. She believes in using what she has collected, everything from 17th- and 18th-century chairs to fabrics woven in the early 19th century, but she’s not out of touch with the 21st century. Some modern conveniences can become inconveniences when it

comes to aesthetics, so she tucks them out of sight as much as possible.

TUNING OUT TELEVISIONS “We all strive to find something to put our TVs in,” Gorman says of antiques aficionados. In the living room, she tucked the tube into a hand-grained corner cabinet. In the kitchen, the set sits behind the doors of a newly built corner cabinet.

PARK THE APPLIANCES “When they said, ‘Do you want a garage in your kitchen?’ I thought they were crazy,” Gorman says. But she visits the “garage” every morning to access her coffeemaker. She also stashes other appliances behind the door beneath the television in the corner cabinet.

HOLD THE PHONE In her bedroom, Gorman displays a handmade silk folding

bonnet and other items atop a maple chest. She tucks her telephone discreetly behind a lamp on the chest.

PUT A LID ON IT A display of firkins — lidded buckets — and churns bring a dash of color to the kitchen with their faded blue and green paint. But they are utilitarian, too. “That’s where I keep dog food,” Gorman says. — Tracy Hobson Lehmann

A mug holds flowers beside some old books, complementing the view of the farm.

SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS

11E

SATURDAY, APRIL 7, 2007

D

Better look through ‘trash’ again There is a saying: “One person’s trash is another person’s treasure.” Collectors understand this better than most other people. Old ads, milk bottles, worn shoes, spark plugs, barbed wire, insulators, credit cards, swizzle sticks, key-chain tags and empty boxes that once held bullets all are seriously collected by groups who have even formed clubs to trade information. ANTIQUES & Did you ever COLLECTING think of saving old paper cups? Not just any paper cup. It should be decorated to show it was used at an event like a World’s Fair or the Olympics. Or it should have an important brand name or picture celebrities. The cup’s decoration must indicate either an event or a date. The Dixie cup, one of the world’s oldest paper cups, was just an idea in 1907. The Public Cup Vendor Co. was incorpo-

RALPH AND TERRY KOVEL

KING FEATURES SYNDICATE

This Tarzan ice-cream cup was made by Lily-Tulip Cup Corp. in the 1930s. Hake’s Americana and Collectibles of Timonium, Md., priced it at $518. You can find paper-cup collectibles for much less, but this one is rare and in mint condition. rated in 1909 to make the cups, and by 1919 it was named the Dixie Cup Co. At first no one wanted disposable cups, but during the flu epidemic of 1918, laws banned public communal drinking glasses. Soon paper cups were also used to hold ice cream and other products, and

more companies started manufacturing throwaway containers. In 1930 pictures of animals or presidents were added to Dixie cup ice-cream lids. Movie stars were featured in 1933 and war planes and ships in the 1940s. Sample prices for cups from past years by various manufacturers include a Coca-Cola cup, 1960, $20; Popeye on a Happy Birthday cup, 1950s, $8; Dairy Queen cup, 1949, $8; and Votes for Women, Empire States, 1915, $200. It pays to save trash. Q. I am 89 and still have a 1902 bathing suit that belonged to my mother. It’s a navy-blue sailor suit with white trim, leggings and high, laced shoes. The shoes are not in good shape, but the rest of it is. What do you think I could sell it for? A. Many suits the age of your mother’s came with leggings and shoes. Women took the shoes off, then went into the water, leggings and all. Collectors of vintage clothing

CURRENT PRICES Current prices are recorded from antiques shows, flea markets, sales and auctions throughout the United States. Prices vary in different locations because of local economic conditions. ■ Piggy bank, ‘I Made Chicago Famous,’ black, cast iron, Arcade, c. 1900, 4 inches, $255. ■

Deb-U-Teen Lunch and Thermo bottle kit, Styrofoam thermos, Hasbro, 1950s, $455.

■

Cast-iron doorstop, English bulldog puppies in barrel, signed ‘Steacy & Wilton Co., Wrightsville, Pa., copyright 1932,’ 63⁄4 by 81⁄4 inches, $695. — Ralph and Terry Kovel

might pay $100 or more for your suit. Write to Kovels, San Antonio Express-News, King Features Syndicate, 300 W. 57th St., 15th Floor, New York, NY 10019.

‘Lifetime of love and collecting’ fill home CONTINUED FROM 10E

acres. She and her husband, Bill, who died in 1996, restored a 1914 hospital in town and lived there 13 years. “When I walked in this awfullooking thing and I saw the walls, I said, ‘Whoa. Wait a minute,’ ” she recalls, noting the 18-inchthick double brick walls. Gorman first settled into a three-room cottage on the property, formerly the display house at Apelt Armadillo Farm. The space that Gorman filled to brimming with folk art is previously where armadillo shells were transformed and sold as baskets, lampshades, ashtrays and purses. She lived there as work progressed on the main house and the property. A building that housed armadillos — an eyesore with a critterkeeping 10-foot-deep ditch and 10foot-tall fence around it — was demolished. From it, Gorman salvaged wide pecky cypress boards that now enclose the space under the stairs in the main house. The restored one-room rock building by the highway, formerly an armadillo barbecue stand, will become an antiques shop. One of Gorman’s greatest challenges in the renovation was adding a kitchen, pantry and laundry room to the main house. Only a slab remained where the original kitchen had been. “Over a period of a hundred-something years, you just do what you have to,” she says of the evolution of the house. The light-filled addition that spans the back of the house marries well with the original structure, thanks to carefully chosen materials and antique furnishings. Bricks laid in a herringbone pattern complement pumpkin-colored cabinets and maple counters in the kitchen. (Gorman says feistily that she wouldn’t reveal her custom paint colors even if she remembered them, to discourage copycats.) Gorman fashioned an island from three pieces. The work area across from the sink is an eightdrawer chest with bin pulls — al-

GLORIA FERNIZ/STAFF

Assorted churns and firkins sit alongside a kitchen island that comprises three separate pieces. Gorman added the kitchen to her 1898 house.

SEE FOR YOURSELF

ing what she owns. “I wouldn’t have anything you couldn’t touch Harriette Gorman’s house will be or use.” Though it pained her, she says, among six houses featured on she cut up handmade crewel fabthe Comfort Heritage ric to make curtains for the living Foundation Tour of Homes. room and library. A smart red When: Noon-5 p.m. April 14. and teal plaid loveseat in the liTickets: In advance, $12. Call Taxi brary wears part of Gorman’s large collection of homespun fabBreithaupt at (830) 995-5018. ric — cloth pioneers wove from Day of tour, $15, starting at 11 thread they spun from flax or cota.m. at Comfort State Bank ton they grew or wool from their Building, High and Seventh sheep. She notes the sun will destreets. teriorate the cloth, so she plans to have shutters made for the winAlso: Tour booklets available at dow by the loveseat. Comfort State Bank Building. The original house on the propmost brand new by her standards erty, a log cabin built in 1854, was at an estimated 80 years old. taken down and reconstructed log Against the back of the chest, she by log as a back entrance to the set a German desk top that looks main house. Like the rest of the like a small trunk atop a low New house, the buttery — the New England table. Above it hangs a England term for a pantry — is light fixture Gorman had made filled with relics from ages past. from a cone-shaped fire bucket. Here, Gorman incorporated a set One of Gorman’s many pas- of stairs that years ago found sions is lighting, and she has ev- their way from a New England erything from small oil-burning house to an antiques shop here. betty lamps to an 18th-century The faded blue paint and a tread scissor light to a goat-skin shaded worn thin from generations of lamp she had fashioned from a use attracted her, though “everybrass eagle finial atop a piece of body in town thought I was crazy tramp art. She also collects — and for buying it.” uses — Pennsylvania redware In their current home, the pottery, pewter, early clothes stairs sit against a wall and rise hangers and treenware, kitchen- to the ceiling, their newfound ware and implements fashioned purpose to display other objects from single pieces of wood. and to show off the patina that Gorman is emphatic about us- comes with time and use.

“I just lug stuff around until I find a use for it,” says Gorman, who began collecting early American antiques more than a halfcentury ago. Her love of old things began with a black iron teakettle she discovered in a junkyard in Tyler. “I thought that was the living end,” she says. “I couldn’t wait to get home and plant red geraniums in it.” Gorman no long has the teakettle — “I wish I did” — but she lives surrounded by antiques and the history they impart. The entryway is filled with pieces from the William and Mary era. Her bedroom is Queen Anne. Upstairs, there’s a Shaker room. Portraits of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln hang in the library, a front room fitted with custom bookcases painted a rich teal and filled with books about historical figures. She used the same teal color on wainscoting, dentil molding and beams. A 48-star flag stands in one corner, and a portrait of Thomas Jefferson hangs above the loveseat. “This is the love of my life,” she says, admiring the Jefferson portrait. “He’s my favorite. He was an ingenious American.” A table in the center of the room displays old marbles and other games, even an old deck of playing cards, showing that early Americans weren’t all work. She marvels at the handwork on rugs and the craftsmanship of the furniture. “It was made on someone’s fingers,” she says often as she looks at various pieces in the house. With every item, she can relate a story about where she found it, how it was made or how it was used. “What you have here is a lifetime of love and collecting,” Gorman says. And she’s not done. There’s the barn to renovate and the garden to create at the place she’s contemplating naming Gorman-Dillo Farm “because I’m the only one who cared enough to fix it up.” [email protected]

Feeding nitrogen and iron: There’s a trick to it Our plants are growing at 90 mph. Warm weather and recent rains have combined to give us maximum spring growth, or so it would seem. Still, there are some things you can do to have even more success with the plants in your landscape and garden, and most of them revolve around proper feedings. Plants need nitrogen to produce new stems and leaves. Therefore, anytime you want a plant to grow more vigorously, the answer you’ll hear everywhere will be to apply a high-nitrogen fertilizer. However, there’s a lot more to the story than that. You see, the middle number in the threenumber fertilizer analysis represents the phosphorus content of the fertilizer. Phosphorus promotes roots, flowers and fruit, so the normal conclusion would be that you need to add more phosphorus to your flower and vegetable gardens. Right? Well, not so fast. Phosphorus may already be there in plentiful quantities. In fact, your soil may actually have too much phosphorus, to the point that it adversely affects the growth of your plants. The only way you can tell whether you have too much phosphorus is with an accurate soil test. It’s a good idea to have one run every two or three

years just to monitor things. Phosphorus tends to accumulate in clay soils. It leaches away in loams and sands but, again, the only way to tell for sure is to have the soil tested. If the report says you need to apply only nitrogen, believe DOWN TO EARTH it and follow its guidelines no matter what type of plant you’re trying to grow. Texas has several highquality, nitrogen-only fertilizers. Ideally, half or more of the nitrogen should be in slow-release form. It may seem odd to add only nitrogen to a rose garden or tomato patch, but if that’s what the soil test suggests, you need to follow its findings. The other critical element that is often deficient is iron. Its story is equally complicated, but boiling it all down to the basics, iron comes in two forms: soluble and insoluble. It will be in the soluble form when soils are acidic, so plants will be able to assimilate any amount that they need. In alkaline soils, however,

NEIL

SPERRY

the iron becomes insoluble and some plants will begin to show iron deficiency. First signs of shortages will appear as yellowing of the end leaves. As the problem progresses, the blades will turn more yellow but the veins will remain dark green. Eventually the leaves will turn pale green all over. In severe cases, they will even be almost white, then browned and scorched. Iron deficiency is also called chlorosis, and plants that are likely to show it around San Antonio include wisterias, ligustrums, mimosas, bald cypresses, box elders, cherry laurels and, for anyone who tries to grow them, azaleas, camellias and dogwoods. It can show up in many other species, but the pattern of yellowing will always be the same; that is, on the newest growth first. You might figure you can just add a little iron to solve all these shortages, but again, it’s not all that easy. If you’re gardening in an alkaline soil and if you add more iron, it may become insoluble, too, just like the iron that is already there. So you need to add iron in tandem with sulfur. The sulfur acts to form sulfuric acid when it gets wet, and that will help keep the iron available, at least tempora-

rily. The best ways to solve iron deficiency follow different paths. You can replace the alkaline soil entirely. Create a planting mix that has generous amounts of organic matter. Material such as peat moss, compost and pine bark mulch are naturally acidic, so iron remains soluble in them. Of course, they’re not inexpensive, so you can only justify going to those measures for plants that will stay small and whose roots won’t outgrow the prepared planting medium. Best trick of all: Stay away from plants you know need high levels of iron in the first place. After all, why create a problem when it’s just as easy to create a solution? Proper feeding is not a difficult or complicated task. It just requires common sense and a little bit of study. From that point on, your plants will take care of the rest. Neil Sperry is publisher of Neil Sperry’s Gardens magazine. His Down to Earth column appears Saturdays in S.A. Life. Though time does not permit Sperry to answer individual gardening questions, readers may suggest topics for future columns by sending him an e-mail at [email protected].

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Spaces

SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS

Bright colors — from buttery yellow to vivid red — saturate the walls in a house featured on a tour today

SATURDAY APRIL 19, 2008 SECTION F

PAGE 12F

Catch the ‘Brothers’ Nothing triggers a nostalgia run like watching a television program from your childhood. Sometimes even the theme song will send you back in time. The theme from “Bonanza” has me sitting on my paternal grandparents’ circa-1970 green shag carpet in San Jose, Calif. An episode of “Happy Days” mentally transports me to my beanbag chair in front of our first color television set, and I never hear the theme from “Sesame Street” without feeling like I am back standing in our teeny two-bedroom apartment in Tucson, Ariz., watching the very first episode while waiting for the school bus to take me to kindergarten in November 1969. All old shows are like that. “Mod Squad” has me in back in the basement in Arlington, Va., with my grandmother, “Northern Exposure” brings me back to my newlywed days, and the theme from “Barney” makes me feel like my daughters are again newborns. TV has always triggered those moments. Nick at Nite counts on it. The shows we grew up with remind us of growing up. So I was absolutely tickled when my 16-year-old daughter hopped in

BY TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN EXPRESS-NEWS HOME AND GARDEN EDITOR

MICHAEL O’ROURKE

See O’ROURKE/3F

G OOD

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TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN

Lobelia (Lobelia erinus) Sometimes the tiniest flowers pack the biggest punch. That’s the case with lobelia, which produces masses of violet- to indigocolored blossoms. It’s a small, cool-weather annual that will cascade without running amok. Use it in annual borders or in containers. It looks particularly striking in contrast with the white of alyssum or the bright yellow of pansies or snapdragons. ■ Light: ■ Size:

Sun to part shade.

4 to 8 inches tall; 12 to 18 inches

wide. ■ Bloom:

Spring and fall.

■ Water:

Moderate.

■ Cultivation:

Replace when warm weather

arrives.

Test your knowledge of Fiesta facts against other San Antonians.

TODAY’S QUESTION Who were King Cotton, Selamat and Omala? To check your answer and watch ‘man on the street’ responses, go to MySA.com. Keyword: Fiesta

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P A G E 1E

COLOR

P U B D A T E 08-05-06

SAN ANTONIO EXPRESS-NEWS SATURDAY AUGUST 5, 2006 SECTION E

O P E R A T O R RREINHARD

D A T E //

TIME:

Coming Sunday

Spaces

Chapter 6 of the Express-News’ staff-written ‘Cora’s Heart’

A New Braunfels couple collect favorite ideas and build their castle PAGE 10E

Mr. Snippy’s really bad day Oh, come on! I was already tired, cranky and, as those who were with me moments before might attest, snippy. Call it Murphy’s Law, karma or dismiss it as just having a bad day, but sometimes it feels as if every molecule in the universe is out to get you. Or at least in the mood to have a solid laugh at your expense. Not a giggle, chortle or a snicker. A fullout, hard-to-catch-your-breath, belly laugh. Early last Saturday morning my wife, Diane, was taking me to pick up our new car. She had an appointment on the other side of town, so she would drop me off, I would close the deal and then drive the car home. It was all so simple, really. Attitude can complicate the simplest task, and even I will admit my attitude was bad. It wasn’t one thing. It was just a bunch of straws and a camel with a bad lower lumbar. I’ll blame lack of sleep because that is kinder than blaming whatever character flaw it is that makes one snippy. When one is predisposed to being crabby, fatigue is simply an accelerant poured on the illtempered fire. We were running late and, as we pulled onto a side street, I got out of the car and began to walk into the dealership. Given my state of mind I didn’t walk as much as I stomped. Diane slowly pulled away. I was already starting to feel guilty about my behavior. It wasn’t a pleasant drive or a pleasant morning for that matter. I was grunting out monosyllabic answers to harmless conversation starters. She tried to cool my mood but, after two decades of me, knew it was better to cut her losses. I was almost to the door of the dealership when I noticed it. My breast pocket seemed heavy. A quick glance told me I had twice as many cell phones in my pocket as usual. I had Diane’s. Honestly, my first instinct was to call her on her phone and tell her I had her cell. Fortunately, I realized the stupidity of that idea almost immediately. Had I actually dialed my phone only to have her phone ring in my pocket I would have felt like the dumbest human on the planet. I’m familiar with that feeling. It has happened before. I took off running. I could see her brake lights. She was heading down a

MICHAEL O’ROURKE

See O’ROURKE/11E

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‘Attraction,’ a hardy day-blooming red lily, puts on a show in a pond at San Angelo’s Civic League Park. It’s part of horticulturist Ken Landon’s International Waterlily Collection. INSET BELOW: A damselfly rests on the petals of ‘Texas Dawn,’ a hardy yellow water lily that can produce as many as 120 blooms a year.

TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN/STAFF

Grower amasses world-class collection

Nectar pools in the golden center of a ‘Rhonda Kay’ star lily at the International Waterlily Collection.

BY TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN

seven years out of my life,” he says. Fellow lily expert PaEXPRESS-NEWS HOME & GARDEN EDITOR trick Nutt, retired from Longwood Gardens in AN ANGELO Pennsylvania, elabo— Giverny had rates on ‘Ineta Ruth,’ a Claude Monet. hybrid developed from a This West lily called ‘St. Louis Texas city has Gold.’ “He’s the only Ken Landon. man who’s been able to Monet created lasting get fertile seeds from ‘St. water lilies on canvas. Louis Gold,’ ” Nutt says Landon’s are born of TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN/STAFF of Landon. seed in concrete ponds ‘St. Louis Gold’ is an or in pools in his greenolder lily developed by Nutt’s mentor, George house, and he dedicates much of his work to Harry Pring of St. Louis. Pring, he says, intromaking the mystical aquatic plants last. duced more Nymphaea hybrids than anyone in “They’re my kids,” Landon says of the plants the world, “although Ken will probably rival in the International Waterlily Collection. And him in time.” what a colorful brood it is. “We’ve tried to preserve his hybrids, and bePink, yellow, purple and white flowers reflect tween the two of us we probably have the best in the pools at Civic League Park, colorful accollection of Pring’s hybrids in the world,” cents amid the varied green leaves. There are Nutt says. smooth leaves and ones with ruffled edges. Landon estimates he has created about 60 There are glossy green circles and ones speck“keeper” hybrids. “In horticultural work, you led with maroon. And there are the giants of keep maybe 5 percent of what you create in a the family, the platterlike Victorias that prolifetime.” duce leaves up to 8 feet across. Another star in Landon’s family tree is NymLandon, 58, is no braggart. But like any phaea violacea. “I was told I couldn’t grow proud parent, he likes to boast about his kids. them in North America,” Landon says, pointTake ‘Ineta Ruth,’ named for his mother and

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the only yellow star lily produced. “That took

See WATER LILY/12E

TEXAS SUPERSTAR LILIES ‘Texas Dawn,’ a yellow water lily developed by Ken Landon, was the leading bloomer among lilies tested for the Texas SuperStar program, according to Jerry Parsons of Texas Cooperative Extension. It and seven other water lilies earn SuperStar status this month for their adaptability to growing conditions throughout the state. The selections include: ■ ‘Texas Dawn,’ hardy yellow ■ ‘Colorado,’ hardy salmon ■ ‘Laydekeri Fulgens,’ hardy red ■ ‘Perry’s Double White,’ hardy white ■ ‘Clyde Ikins,’ hardy apricot ■ ‘Panama Pacific,’ tropical purple ■ ‘Star of Siam,’ tropical blue ■ ‘Red Flare,’ tropical night bloomer

Keyword: Gardening Learn more about water lilies.

PETER A. HOGG/MONROVIA

Split-leaf philodendron (Philodendron selloum) With frilly leaves that grow as big as 3 feet long, the split-leaf philodendron makes an impressive stand in the landscape. And it does so without causing a fuss. The cascade of dark, glossy leaves on the mounding plant make it a nice addition to the landscape. The plant tolerates even deep shade and gives a tropical accent but tolerates our Zone 8b winters if planted in a protected area. Use as a foundation planting, near a pool or in large containers. ■ Light: Shade to part sun. ■ Size: 10 feet tall; 15 feet wide. ■ Water: Low. ■ Bloom: Creamy white spathe in summer. Not a significant bloom. ■ Cultivation: Water regularly to establish.

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PATRICK DOVE/SPECIAL TO THE EXPRESS-NEWS PATRICK DOVE/SPECIAL TO THE EXPRESS-NEWS

Landon wades through the center pool at the International Waterlily Collection to collect plants to send to gardens near Houston. Landon develops and collects the plants.

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The ‘Larissa Racine’ water lily is a new creation by San Angelo’s Ken Landon. The flower has not yet reached the market.

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Where: Civic League Park, San Angelo. Located on North Park Street between Harris and Beauregard avenues.

the International Waterlily Collection. Tour the collection and see the latest hybrids developed by horticulturist Ken Landon. When: 9 a.m.-noon

Sept. 16. Landon will lead a tour at 11 a.m.

Admission: Free. Info: (325) 657-4279 or SanAngeloTexas.org. PATRICK DOVE/SPECIAL TO THE EXPRESS-NEWS

ABOVE: A flower of ‘Ineta Ruth’ rises above a pond at the International Waterlily Collection. Ken Landon, who developed it, named the plant for his mother. LEFT: A bee hovers over a flower of Nymphaea ‘Blue Cloud.’

TRACY HOBSON LEHMANN/STAFF

to perpetuate the species. “His focus is to preserve . . . Nymphaea from all around the world, not just Texas, not just the South, not just the United States, but the entire world, which is a pretty awesome task,” says Paula Biles, executive director of the International Waterlily and Water Gardening Society based in Bradenton, Fla. From two seedlings of Nymphaea gigantea, a species native to Australia, Landon created ‘Blue Cloud,’ a lavender-blue flower. “We have it in the pool at Longwood,” Nutt says of the hybrid. “It’s our pride and joy.” Visitors to the West Texas park can see giganteas blooming in their entire color range — pink, blue and white. Often, garden guests from Australia have never seen a single variety of the plant in their homeland, Nutt says. Landon notes the park display represents only about 1 percent of his plant family, which he says is the largest collection of the genus Nymphaea in the world. He grows the plants in a greenhouse in Miles, about 20 miles north-

east of here and at gardens around the world. While this semiarid region, with an annual rainfall average of 18 inches, seems an improbable place to establish a worldclass water lily garden, Landon settled here to be near family. In 1988, he took over a pond built in the 1930s as a reflective pool in a Works Progress Administration project, and with the support of the local Council of Garden Clubs transformed the muddy mess into what is now the main pond. Five smaller ponds surround the center pool, and there’s room for one more that will be built as funding allows. Landon says he has turned down potentially lucrative offers to relocate the collection. He owns all the plants, and the city pays his salary as curator. Guests, with cameras clicking, wander the labyrinth of sidewalks among the pools. Some focus their lenses on the flowers. Others use the lilies as backdrops for family photos, capturing the next generation with the plants Landon has preserved for them. National Geographic pho-

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ing to the thriving plants and underscoring his defiant nature. “It took me two years to get ’em up, but they are up.” The plants, which he describes as temperamental, like 90-degree water and little movement in the water. Landon grew the tubers last year, overwintered them and then grew the plants this year. “To see this flower blooming here, to John Q. Public it doesn’t mean anything,” he says. “For a botanist or botanical enthusiast or water lily expert, it’s meaningful.” Nutt, who describes as “a pilgrimage” his visit to West Texas from the 1,000-acre garden in Pennsylvania created by Pierre duPont, says Landon “probably has one of the finest displays of water lilies in the world.” While he concentrates on creating hybrids, he also is intent on preserving the species. A decade ago, Landon founded the International Waterlily Preservation Repository, through which he collects specimens and shares seeds. When flooding on the Nile River threatened the sacred blue lily of the Nile (N. caerulea), Egyptian officials called Landon and came here to get 2 million seeds to restart the plant. Of the large order, Landon says, “It’s not hard to do because each seed pod has 60,000 to 70,000 seeds.” Landon treks to jungles and remote locales in search of rare specimens, and he relates stories of hopscotching across an alligator’s head (he thought it was a rock until its mouth opened) and other harrowing adventures to get his hands on seldom-seen aquatic plants. “The gene pool is going away,” he says of the genus that is threatened by flooding, swamp draining for development and encroaching populations in thirdworld countries. “They’re not worried about lilies, they’re worried about surviving,” he says. Efforts to wipe out invasive species such as water hyacinth sometimes wipe out noninvasive nymphaeas, and hybrids also take over established species. Landon worries that future generations won’t know the plants he knows. But he’s trying

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Water lily collection among the best

tographers have come calling to document rare species. And if this is an unlikely location for a world-class water garden, Landon is an unlikely gardener. Trained as an industrial engineer with a minor in botany, his love for water lilies began when he was a teen building a pond in Albuquerque, N.M. After a bit of searching, he found a retailer who ordered an aquatic plant for him. That plant died when the family moved to Fort Worth in the 1960s, but Landon’s mother spotted a newspaper story about a woman selling water lilies, and Landon began digging a pond. He overnighted his new plant in the garage before the pool was complete and was smitten by the sweet fragrance of the flower that greeted him the next morning. “I was hooked,” he recalls. Landon’s work has earned him a spot in the International Water Gardening Society Hall of Fame. That, however, isn’t what he views as his greatest claim to fame. Landon also finds time to indulge his passion for pyrotechnics. He received a call from the White House to supply strobe star fireworks for President Reagan’s second inauguration. Locals, in fact, know Landon as well for his annual Fourth of July fireworks display as for his water lilies. Giverny couldn’t say that for Monet.

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It’s a spoof, but its designs are within reach of most BY LINDA HALES WASHINGTON POST

The furnishing emporium Design Within Reach offers an enviable stock of modern classics by catalog, online and in stores. But to some shoppers, prices remain inaccessible. That’s what sparked the spoof: Design Without Reach. “Not everyone can afford to be patrons of modern design,” explains the Web site Thwart design.com, which offers instructions for making replicas — in minutes and for pennies. Impoverished fans of Alessi’s $85 crumpled stainless-steel fruit bowl can crumple their own container from a sheet of aluminum foil. An homage to George Nelson’s iconic Ball clock ($285 at

DWR) can be fabricated with a clock mechanism, the circular end of a cardboard salt container and 12 colorful Tootsie Roll Pops inserted around the edge. You get what you pay for, but the homemade aesthetic is part of the exercise. The replicas were dreamed up by Rob Price, a 27-year-old graduate of Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. He designs Cuisinart and KitchenAid housewares by day and saves “raw creativity” for home. Price says he built each of the replicas. The clock had to come down after the Tootsie Roll Pops melted on his wall. However one decides to allocate cash for flash, Thwart Design’s manifesto emphasizes: “Don’t let creativity lie dormant.”

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