An Earthly Paradise

Through his writings, through his association with some of the area's best-known gardens and gardeners, and through his own carefully tended plot of land (at what is now the site of Caribbean Gardens in Naples), botanist Henry Nehrling changed the way people perceived the Southwest Florida landscape. In his journals and gardening columns, written for The American Eagle in Estero in the 1920s, Nehrling celebrated everything that was natural about this earthly paradise and despaired at the changes that threatened it.

Born in Wisconsin in 1853, Nehrling pursued an interest in natural science to Texas, where he became known for his writings on ornithology, and grew interested in tropical horticulture. In 1886 he bought property in Florida and worked toward settling there permanently, considering its temperate climate the perfect place to grow tropical plants. Nehrling created a majestic garden in Gotha, near Orlando, cultivating tens of thousands of caladiums and other plants. He lost more than half of them in a freeze in 1917, a traumatic event that he mentioned often in his writings. Looking for a safe place for his beloved plants, he fled to a tract of farmland in Naples, leaving his wife to take care of the Gotha garden.

The parcel, now in the heart of the city, was then several miles north of town. Although Nehrling reveled in his solitude in letters to friends, he was no recluse. He socialized with the smart set of Midwestern travelers at the now-gone Naples Hotel. He explored the entire region, sometimes accompanied by some of the most notable local leaders of the day: Judge E.G. Wilkinson, John Hachmeister, E.W. Crayton and others. He worked in Fort Myers on the gardens at friend Thomas Edison's estate and in Everglades City as Barron Collier developed his model company town.

Landscape architect David Driapsa, who has done extensive research into Nehrling's life and work, says that far from being a lone voice, Nehrling was part of an important national movement in landscape architecture. "He, among others, was looking to wilderness for inspiration for his garden design," Driapsa says. Although Nehrling introduced new plants here (his mail often overflowed with specimens from botanical gardens in Hong Kong, Jamaica, Italy, India and Brazil), he particularly appreciated Southwest Florida's natural treasures, from the stately royal palms planted in downtown Fort Myers to the pond apple trees growing in the swamps east of Naples. Ornamental horticulture is a huge industry today, Driapsa says, but in Nehrling's time it was often dismissed as a romantic pursuit. His readers shared his enthusiasm, though, so much so that at times he protested that he couldn't keep up with the volume of mail.

After Nehrling's death in 1929, the publisher of The American Eagle collected the botanist's writings in a book called My Garden in Florida. Edited by the late Dr. Robert W. Read, botanist emeritus of the Smithsonian Institution and longtime Naples resident, Nehrling's writings have been reissued by the University Press of Florida. Read himself is remembered for his work with the Conservancy of Southwest Florida and the Naples Botanical Garden. Excerpted here, Nehrling's Early Florida Gardens and Nehrling's Plants, People and Places in Early Florida tell the story of the pioneering botanist's joyous sojourn in what was then a wild frontier.

Henry Nehrling explains how he came to Naples, then a village with only a couple of hundred residents and a seasonal population centered at the Naples Hotel:

Recently a friend said to me, "What are you doing here in this wilderness, without neighbors or amusements? This hermit's life would be intolerable to me." I answered him, that a lover of nature is sufficient to himself where he may be, and for a plant enthusiast this is not a dull existence but Paradise.

Nehrling on the 1917 freeze that killed his plants in Gotha, prompting him to take his plants to Naples:

Thus, in my sixty-sixth year, I again became a pioneer in the wilderness. The hardships that I had to overcome and the disappointments that I met were legion. The soil had appeared to be good, but I found that during the rainy season a very high water-table made it impossible for deep-rooting plants to do well. In my garden at Gotha everything had been different. Although the land there was high, dry pineland, almost all the plants started into vigorous growth as soon as they were planted. There my only troubles had been occasional heavy freezes, but in this new land there were many days of such disappointment and discouragement that I longed for Gotha again, freezes and all!

However, that is all of the past now, and I have learned to love and understand this more southern garden. I call this place my "Tropical Garden" and derive much happiness from the great variety of truly tropical species that I can grow here. As I look out of my window at the orchid-laden trees, I wonder what more life could offer anywhere.

Most entries are undated, but this one, from 1925, describes the quiet pleasures that Nehrling enjoys in Naples, and the challenges he faces in growing plants in a new climate:

I t is easter, and i am alone in the wilderness of South Florida. In the evening I hear the surf, the Gulf of Mexico being only about a mile to the west. The loud calls of the whippoorwills near my little bungalow imbue every night with a delight that can only be felt, but not described, while during the daytime the joyous notes of the mocking-bird make the air ring with sweet music.

Nehrling on Florida:

I t is an indisputable fact that the true nature lover, who has enjoyed this delightful climate, the cool ocean breezes, the enchanting moonlit nights and all the charms that nature has spread out with a lavish hand for all those who really seek to understand her, cannot stay away from Florida for a long period without becoming homesick.

Florida is a great silent poem of color and light, of bird song and plant beauty. The glossy foliage of Magnolia grandiflora and other evergreen glitters in the bright sunshine, and the placid waters of the lakes sparkle like mirrors. The tourists and winter residents who come and go like the robin and the bluebird do not know Florida as it really is. They do not know our summer, the most delightful season of the year.

florida has been called the playground of the rich and the paradise of the poor. In reality it is the paradise of the man with ideals, of the nature lover and of the horticulturist. There are drawbacks, to be sure, but untouched nature is perfect.

Nehrling connected with sympathetic souls in Naples, including Judge Wilkinson, the city's first elected mayor, whose house still stands as the oldest in Naples:

One of the most ardent plant hunters I have ever met is Judge E. G. Wilkinson of Naples. In his younger days he often accompanied the late botanist and collector, A.H. Curtiss, in his excursions through the primeval forests of Florida. In this way he has become a real woodsman. These rambles have made him a lover of all that is rare, unique and beautiful among the wild plants. Several years ago he invited me to accompany him to a so-called Pop Ash and Pond-Apple swamp. In July, 1921, he-then county commissioner and promoter of the famous Tamiami Trail-had contemplated to surprise me with a new picture of wild forest scenery. He told me that we would motor along the Tamiami Trail for a distance of about 30 miles. We went through forest and glades, through Cypress swamps and over grassy prairies. Finally we halted in a dense hammock. A most wonderful picture presented itself to my dazzled eyes-dozens of lofty Royal Palms overtowering the forest everywhere around them. There must have been at least a hundred of these sublime giants scattered over a large area. I was simply overwhelmed by a sensation of grand-eur. This day will always be remembered as a red letter day of my life.

Prof. C.S. Sargent has said that this wonderful Royal Palm hammock is situated on Rogue's River-an ominous name, when we consider that only a short while ago more than 25 of these century-old giants have been ruthlessly destroyed by some rogues and rascals who should be sent for at least 25 years behind iron bars. This palm hammock is now owned by a wide-awake man, a man of visions and ideals-Mr. Barron G. Collier-who intends to create here a state park for the benefit and education of future generations.

On our way home Mr. Wilkinson led me through a cypress swamp, partly under water, to a pond-like depression surrounded by old mossy and gnarled pond-apple trees, loaded from top to bottom with air plants and other epiphytes. I was spellbound, but at least 300 feet of shallow water were between me and this interesting group. Without much thought I waded through the water, which was scarcely more than two or three feet deep. I suddenly struck a deep hole, five to six feet and more deep, and I went up to my neck into it. I had struck an alligator hole, but none of the saurians seemed to be at home, or I would not have been able to crawl out alive.