A group of volunteers representing both the Bow Garden Club and the local Making Strides Against Breast Cancer organization recently provided the fall planting of the Garden of Hope located at Memorial Field. A literal truck load of deep pink/magenta chrysanthemums, generously donated by Pleasant View Gardens in Loudon, were lovingly planted within the confines of the cancer ribbon-shaped garden originally created in 2004. The garden was designed by Making Strides Against Breast Cancer volunteers with the support of the Greater Concord Community, and consists of an approximately 20-by-10 foot granite-edged, cancer ribbon-shaped garden dedicated to all who have been touched by breast cancer. The original donations of materials were made by Swenson Granite Works, Brochu Nursery & Landscaping, Pleasant View Gardens and Outdoor World & Stonescapes.
Each year the Garden of Hope is planted with dozens of pink cascading petunias in June and is re-planted in late September or early October with pink chrysanthemums, all donated by Pleasant View Gardens. Members of the Bow Garden Club have been planting the garden together with Making Strides volunteers over the past eight years and the garden is weeded, watered, mulched and maintained regularly throughout the summer months by a handful of volunteers with assistance by the city of Concord ground maintenance crews. Each October, the Garden of Hope becomes a focal point of the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk, when participants and supporters gather at Concord’s Memorial Field to honor those affected by breast cancer and to hold their annual fundraising event. Of the 270 American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walks taking place around the country every year, the Concord event is consistently the No. 1 per capita in the United States, raising more than $500,000 each year in donations. Concord’s Garden of Hope is a community jewel – a place of solace, remembrance, beauty and of course eternal hope.
