Memorial gardens to get spruce up

Plans are afoot to rejuvenate the Blue Mountains’ AIDS memorial gardens in Medlow Park, Medlow Bath, just north of Katoomba.

Pink Mountains web editor Kevin Hardwick, a member of the committee that began plans for the memorial in 1992, told the Star Observer that before the gardens were establsihed the area had been taken over by blackberries.

The committee was greatly assisted by its chair, local business identity Morris Cooper OAM, and the late Senator James McClelland, in gaining council permission for the park and overcoming local opposition.

“We planted a lot of maples, silver birches, and other trees and shrubs,” Hardwick said.

“A lot of the trees and shrubs have grown quite well but it’s in a state of disrepair at the moment and it needs some work.

“We put plaques remembering someone who had died of AIDS with all the trees originally but they’ve been vandalised or hit by ride-on mowers so a lot have disappeared. Someone even went round with a sledgehammer at one stage and bashed a lot of them.

“But we still have all the names of the people that were planted for so we’re planning to have a large rock with a metal plaque with those names inscribed on it in the park. That will be less prone to vandalism.”

Hardwick said the park had been looked after for many years, but the grief of the AIDS crisis had taken its toll on the people responsible for it, causing them to drift away.

“The reason I think it fell apart was burnout — we were losing our friends,” Hardwick said.

The Three Sisters Blue Mountains social group has donated $250 towards replacing cherry trees that have died in the park, while Hardwick has approached the local TAFE for help and is organising a series of working bees.

“We’ll have a picnic and do a little bit of work to tidy the place up,” Hardwick said.
“The things need doing are things like removing the dead trees, pruning, mulching, weeding, sweeping, raking — general maintenance stuff like that.”

Hardwick expects the first working bee to be held in the next couple of months, and encourages anyone in the Blue Mountains GLBT community who would like to help to contact him.

info: If you’d like to help, contact Kevin Hardwick via www.pinkmountains.com.au