Longvue Acres Garden Club: Gibsonia

8/30/2016

Tour of Eden Hall Campus Farm ~ Gibsonia, PA

August 23, 2016

The Eden Hall Campus Farm, gifted by the Eden Hall Foundation to Chatham University, serves as their North Campus. In the next twenty - thirty years, student enrollment at the Campus Farm is projected to rival that of the other two Chatham campuses. Their Master Plan for development is available on their website.

The focus at the Farm is on sustainable living, conservation, green development, and energy and water management. Since the campus was built from the ground up, it has its own self-contained waste management system. Despite having their own system, state regulations require connecting to the local municipal waste and fresh water systems.

Our tour was led by the well-versed Kelly Henderson who is currently the Campus Farm K-12 Grade coordinator. The tour featured the LEEDS certified buildings, the sustainable landscape, and supporting systems, but time and darkness prevented us from seeing some of the main parts of the 388 acre Campus. Building materials, fresh air, watering, cistern, and a geothermal system for heating and cooling are all part of being sustainable. We toured the Field Lab for aqua culture and, as a side note, the first meal of their homegrown tilapia fish will be served in the dining hall this fall. The greenhouse tunnel contained prolific tomatoes, peppers, and egg plant all destined for the dining hall.

The curriculum at this campus focuses on sustainability which can include food science, aquaculture, water and waste systems, landscape design, and some animal husbandry. Bachelor and master degrees are available on the items listed above.

This farm was originally owned by Sebastian Mueller, a cousin and later son-in-law of H. J. Heinz. It was a recreational retreat for women employees at H. J. Heinz. LAGC’s Helen Dean went on several retreats there. As described by the Post-Gazette, when the retreat closed, “Happy memories of swimming, hiking, bowling, playing tennis and horseback riding are all the "Eden Hall Farm girls" have left of the idyllic vacations they spent in the country setting of Eden Hall Farm in Richland.”

The farm is a work in progress but now has a residence hall, dining hall, café, rain gardens, filter systems, etc. The barn will house a future stage. The quiet campus is beautiful outside and inside; the trails and dining hall are open to the public. The landscape contains many plants not frequently seen in quantity such as ink berry (not edible), button bush, paw paw trees, etc. Check the Eden Hall Campus website for more information including workshops and activities.