GREENFIELD — Paul Norton loves when strangers stop to roll down their car windows and pay him a compliment as they’re driving through downtown Greenfield.
Norton, a Greenfield Parks Department employee commonly known as “the flower guy,” said hundreds of people have stopped to compliment the colorful blooms he keeps watered along the city streets each summer.
“They can’t believe how beautiful and transformative Greenfield looks. We’ve been compared to Nashville, Indiana, and that’s a big compliment,” he said.
In his five years working for the parks department, Norton has led the effort for Greenfield’s annual Day of Planting, a time when volunteers roll up their sleeves and set about filling the city’s decorative planters, hanging baskets and flower beds with colorful blooms.
About 15 people gathered in the Greenfield Christian Church parking lot Wednesday afternoon, May 12, for the big event, which started out with a pep talk and some direction from Norton.
“Let’s get to it,” he said, as the volunteers fanned out in several directions, where small pots of perennials were waiting alongside concrete pots and flower beds.
Under sunny blue skies, the crew made quick work of the job, taking about an hour to get more than 800 wave petunias, sweet potato vines and ornamental grasses tucked into the dirt. The city’s plants will have the same red, white and blue theme as they did last year.
“I look forward to this day all year,” said Bobbi Anderson, chairwoman for Greenfield in Bloom, the nonprofit that organizes the annual day of planting.
“The flowers downtown really make such a difference,” said Anderson, administrative assistant for the Greenfield Parks Department, where she often fields calls complimenting the downtown floral display.
“We get hundreds of comments each year on how pretty it is,” she said.
About half the volunteers Wednesday were members of the Hancock County Master Gardeners, who traditionally lend their expertise at the annual event.
Lynn Meier, who became a master gardener nearly four years ago, said it’s an honor to help transform the downtown into a tapestry of colorful blooms.
“I think it makes a great impression. You can’t help but think it’s a nice town when you drive through,” she said. “It shows that the people here really care about the community.”
She and her planting partner for the day, Sally Parsons, both showed up Wednesday ready to get their hands dirty, bundled up in black fleece jackets with gardening gloves and trowels in hand.
Parsons, an active member of the city’s tree-fostering organization, Regreening Greenfield, said the trees and flowers downtown make a memorable impression.
“All the colorful blooms really make Greenfield stand out when people are passing through,” she said.
Norton said a ton of planning goes into designing the floral landscape, which is a labor of love. He spends time at home going over the inventory and layout of each plant, and provides volunteers with a diagram of just where each flower should go — right down to the color of each petunia.
Throughout the summer, it’s his job to maintain the plants, which involves much more than just watering, he said.
“It involves fertilizing, watering, pruning, trimming and pinching off flowers… everything you’d do in your garden,” he said.
“It’s knowing when to water, how much to water, and taking into account the temperature and cloud cover. There’s a scientific exercise I go through each day.”
Norton praises the collaboration of city officials and the volunteers who make the annual spring planting possible.
“I’m proud of our volunteers, of how quickly they step up to pitch in,” he said. “I love Greenfield for that. You don’t get that everywhere.”
Meier said it’s an honor to help but admits it also gives volunteers bragging rights throughout the summer. “It was fun to drive through last year with the grandkids and say, ‘Look, Grandma planted those,’” she said.
Fellow master gardener Peggy Robertson also gets a kick out of seeing the flowers bloom each year after helping plant them.
Each summer, she hears comments from people all over town about how great the flowers look downtown.
“People just like to drive through on a pretty day like this and look around. It’s beautiful,” she said.
While flowers were planted in the city’s flower pots and hanging baskets, Norton said the sidewalk beds around town won’t be planted this year, due in part to road construction taking place downtown.
“That was a collaborative decision between the mayor, the street department and the parks,” he said, pointing out that the construction and chemicals would make it hard for the flowers at street-level to survive.
“We hope to revisit the idea again next year,” Norton said.
