"I once asked an old gardener how much land he had & he said with pride that he had one acre; & he added, 'It is a wonderful acre; it reaches to the center of the earth in one direction and it takes in the stars in the other.'" –Liberty Hyde Bailey, The Harvest of the Year to the Tiller of the Soil

Updates! Given our progress, Cornell has given us more time to raise funds; a $675,000 grant application has been submitted; and I am officially Director of the Liberty Hyde Bailey Center Project. All this and more in our latest newsletter (consider subscribing!): eepurl.com/QoTwnLpW_7

Sell that robot! With thanks to Shel Silverstein (in Falling Up)

Follow-up to yesterday's post about David Williston, first professionally-trained Black landscape architect whose work shaped the campuses of many HBCUs. This photo shows Williston, fourth standing from left, with the Horticultural Lazy Club in 1896. Williston was the first Black member of the club.

Late in life, accomplished Black landscape architect David Williston wrote that his professor Liberty Hyde Bailey “inspired me to study plant life, and I am happy to state that I was a student of his for more than 60 years.” Williston's remarkable story should be better known in its own right.

Big news time: I'm moving cross country to Ithaca, NY, with my family to try to save the historic home and herbarium/greenhouse complex of Liberty Hyde Bailey and leverage it for the public good, doing work at the intersections of climate and democracy. More here: open.substack.com/pub/johnlins...

One of my biggest academic publications appeared early this year while off social media: an edition, with my introduction and endnotes, of the "Corrected Edition" of the long poem Outlook by Liberty Hyde Bailey. A long-time dream (since 2012 or so), submitted over 2 years ago, finally in the world.

The theme of today’s freezer load is John’s publications, Hurston books, and some randos. Remediation from the Jackson Hall Mold Outbreak of 2025 continues.

In today’s edition of Back-Patio Mold Remediation, John encounters fire ants and later gets to rush home as church gets out during a freak five-minute shower on a zero-chance-of-precipitation day. (Photo taken before the drama; rain damage minimal)

The latest crop has been incorporated into the home shelving. More and more and more and… “The Hidden Kingdom of Fungi” is strategically placed, yes

Another day, another book crop. Thanks again to Rachel at the Learning Commons for letting me borrow space in their chest freezer as I continue to slowly save my library from the Jackson Hall Mold Outbreak of 2025.

So it continues.

Latest batch out of mold remediation. These are my South Haven history books (from way back when i was writing my MFA thesis), plus a book on Lake Superior that my grandparents feature in and a couple volumes of Country Life in America. If anyone knows any SH history books I don’t have, let me know!

It was good yesterday to organize the bit that I’ve managed to save from the campus mold office so far. By the time I’m through (probably sometime in the fall), this unit will be full and I’ll have to purchase a new bookcase.

This is a small fraction of the mold-infested library I’m slowly rescuing from my office.

The mold spot I found on the ceiling outside of my office on Fri, which thanks to me calling it in was finally addressed Mon. It was a condensation drip right in an area the HVAC’s intake vent was pulling from, blowing mold spores and moisture into our offices—probably for over a month now.

This is one of two wagonloads I brought across campus to the freezer in the library yesterday. About one wagonload fit; the other I was able to leave, and I still had enough bagged books left over to fill our fridge freezer at home. Did i mention it was above 90° and also the elevator was down?

Got the rest of the Bailey books and a scattering of others bagged today. Hoping to take a load to the chest freezer at the library tomorrow, where they will need to spend at least 24 hours to halt mold growth before I start taking loads to the back patio of our place for UV treatment on sunny days.

The first batch of treated books arrives to the shelf at home. Progress. Now multiply this by thirty or something and that’s what I have ahead…

Finally, just for fun, a reading from my office today. Yes, that’s 87% humidity.

This message was written inside the old book. So long, friend. You’ve moved with me through four states. I do intend to remember you.

I’ll be throwing some that I don’t need away. Among them was this old nineteenth-century school reader in bad shape. I picked it up at a dingy old Ben Franklin store in Swedesburg, IA, out of a box of old used books, while there for family research related to my MFA thesis. Yesterday it felt damp.

I realized we had good space in the dining room, so the old storage shelving system (which was my double-stack answer to book storage in NYC) is up and waiting for the first set of treated books from the office. I no longer remember who at NYU recommended this to me, but it’s been perfect.

Phase 2. After 3 hours of intense natural UV rays, they were bagged, then left to come to room temp on the floor of the kitchen, and now they’re chilling in the freezer, where they’ll spend at least 24 hours. This is just the first of many batches. For future batches, the process will be reversed.

Never been so grateful for this:

When life gives you an 80%-humidity office at work, full of mold and mold on most of your most valuable books, you begin to do strange things on the back patio. This is what I’ll be doing the rest of the summer… (next they are bound for the freezer… or as many of them as we can fit)

Current state of the course planning shelf (L-R—ENGL 321: African American Literature, TREK 115: Credo, and ENGL 201: Literature and Environment)

Great to have a mom in town for a big birthday. Lots of warm fuzzies in this little corner of Shreveport tonight.

Post-semester return to the body: open.substack.com/pub/johnlins...