UWF Community Garden History

A Long Garden History

The first successful community garden at UWF was planted in summer 2009 when the club began its partnership with Manna Food Bank, a local food pantry in downtown Pensacola and was located at Azalea Trace near campus. For the time that the UWF Garden club was involved at Azalea Trace, participants gained hands-on experience in garden maintenance. Students were given responsibilities over crops, the irrigation system, and composting with help from Chartwells, the on-campus food vendor.

The garden moved to on campus for its second location in the spring of 2010 under the leadership of UWF Honors Student Anne Swisshelm and Honors Associate Director Dr. Gregory Tomso. UWF Students Asa Furman, Hilary Turner, and Joey Davis also helped to establish the garden in its second location near the UWF soccer fields. This garden consisted of 16 raised beds and each of those were “adopted” by different groups on campus and used for growing.

In Fall 2014, the UWF Community Garden moved to our final location on campus and we have been hard at work ever since to expand our mission and grow our garden beyond the walls of raised beds. This final move would not have been possible without the countless hours of leadership from UWF Honors students Jini Curry and Tanner Brunnworth. Together they helped transform our garden from a collection of raised beds to the foundation for the sanctuary it will become.