Caelan Alford, a Fortville teen, recently converted a dumpster storage space into a garden shed for his Eagle Scout project, per the request of Vernon Township Trustee Florence May. The garden shed will kickstart the creation of a community garden/nature preserve. Wednesday, Jan. 04, 2023.
FORTVILLE — A Fortville teenager recently transformed a brick dumpster enclosure into a garden shed for his Eagle Scout project.
The shed will soon store supplies for the Vernon Township Community Gardens, to be developed just east of the Vernon Township Trustee office at 602 Vitality Drive in Fortville.
Caelan Alford said it took over 170 man-hours to complete the job, but he had lots of help from his dad, brother and several fellow scouts.
“We’ve worked with a lot of Eagle Scouts over the years, and Caelan’s team was just first class,” said Vernon Township trustee Florence May.
“They worked really hard and they worked on the project in freezing cold temperatures and were very resilient, but the end product is just beautiful. You can tell it’s a real work of craftsmanship,” she said.
On Tuesday, Dec. 3, Caelan was recognized at the Vernon Township Trustee meeting for his hard work.
The Mt. Vernon High School senior said it was a labor of love.
“My (scout) troop is based out of Fishers, but rather than do something outside of my community I wanted to focus on something in my community,” said Caelan, 18, the son of Alan and Elizabeth Alford.
It was May who suggested converting the former dumpster into a garden shed for use at the Vernon Township community gardens, which will be developed later this year.
She and Caelan started discussing the idea back in July, and Caelan gathered the materials. The experience taught him a lot about carpentry and teamwork, he said.
The longtime scout said he had a great time building the 9-by-9-foot shed, using the former brick dumpster enclosure as the base and building up from there. A muralist will soon add a welcome sign and some garden-themed artwork to the outer brick.
May said the shed is the perfect addition to the future community garden space, which will be developed for shared public use.
“It will include a big community garden, flower gardens, a small orchard and a children’s nature area,” she said, “as well as a pavilion used as a gathering space.”
The first step was getting the garden shed in place to store the gardening tools and supplies.
The gardens will take up green space between the Vernon Township trustee office and the Vernon Township Fire Station 431, both located on Vitality Drive. It will also occupy some of the space just west of the adjacent Mercy Road Church and incorporate a small pond behind the firehouse.
May said the gardens will be an expansion of the previous community garden at the former township trustee office at 700 W. Broadway St., which yielded 1,000 pounds of produce that was donated to local food pantries in 2020 and 2021.
“That garden was started during COVID and was meant to be our Victory Garden in terms of facing COVID but still achieving community engagement,” May recalled.
Since selling that property two years ago, township trustees have been thinking of how to revitalize the community garden concept. They worked with landscaping students from Ball State University last year to get feedback on what the public thought a community garden should entail.
“We got a lot of great input,” said May. “I was a little surprised by the detail people went into and the things people wanted to see, and by the amount of excitement over the inclusion of a children’s nature area rather than another playground.”
The community garden will allow the public to grow their own vegetables or simply enjoy nature while walking through the grounds or hanging out in the pavilion.
May said it will take about four years to get the gardens fully developed, but that the public should be able to start planting vegetables this summer.
“Right now, we’re dealing with a lot of pieces like drainage and irrigation and moving the earth. There’s a complexity to it so we’re taking it in stages, but the first phase will be the community garden,” she said.
Caelan is happy that his Eagle Scout project was the first step toward making the community garden space a reality.
Now that the work is done, he’s focused on finishing up the wrestling season at Mt.Vernon High School and thinking about college, where he’d like to study mechanical engineering.
