Today we celebrate what I'm calling Dependence Day for Gardeners. We'll also learn about the gutta-percha pioneer - it's a fascinating story. We celebrate the California botanist who is remembered with a plant name and the name of a Canyon - and she was a tremendous conservationist. We also celebrate a botanist who is a sentimental favorite of mine - she died while collecting samples in the Western Himalayas almost eighty years ago today. We honor National Meadows Day - an annual celebration of the wildflower meadows of England - with some poetry. We Grow That Garden Library™ with a fiction book that was the Winner of the Man Asian Literary Prize, and the main character finds "solace among the jungle-fringed tea plantations of [the] Cameron Highlands," and she also meets some incredible gardeners. And then we'll wrap things up with the flowers for the birthday of President Calvin Coolidge - in 1924 one newspaper headline said, "Cal's Cool and 52". But first, let's catch up on some Greetings from Gardeners around the world and today's curated news.   Subscribe Apple | Google | Spotify | Stitcher | iHeart   Gardener Greetings To participate in the Gardener Greetings segment, send your garden pics, stories, birthday wishes and so forth to Jennifer@theDailyGardener.org And, to listen to the show while you're at home, just ask Alexa or Google to play The Daily Gardener Podcast. It's that easy.   Curated News Just moved? Build a Temporary Garden at Your New Home by Shawna Coronado "It's a smart plan to set up a temporary garden at your new home when you have just moved because you don't really understand the "lay of the land" in your garden yet. Understanding your garden takes at least a year. A YEAR!?!?! Yes. A year. An example of this is that the sunshine changes throughout your garden. In the winter, you might have the direct sun in some places, creating micro-climates, while in the summer, you could have the opposite. Understanding your sun, water, and other conditions on your property take a while."   No Independence Day for Gardener   (Click here to read my original blogpost)   Alright, that's it for today's gardening news. Now, if you'd like to check out my curated news articles and blog posts for yourself, you're in luck, because I share all of it with the Listener Community in the Free Facebook Group - The Daily Gardener Community. There's no need to take notes or search for links - the next time you're on Facebook, search for Daily Gardener Community and request to join. I'd love to meet you in the group.   Important Events 1804   Today is the birthday of the gutta-percha pioneer Henry Bewley who was born on this day in Dublin, Ireland. A trained chemist, Bewley began work manufacturing soda water. Bewley's work with soda got him in touch with Charles Hancock, who was eager to develop a stopper for bottles. Hancock's solution came to him in the form of gutta-percha - a tough, rubber-like substance that had been discovered in the sap of Malayasian trees and brought to England in the mid-1840s. After Hancock showed Bewley the gutta-percha, he set about inventing the machine that would extrude the gutta-percha into tubing, which would ultimately find a purpose in dentistry and as an insulator for electrical wiring. Although their partnership would not last, Bewley and Hancock formed the Gutta Percha Company in London on February 4, 1845. Twenty years later, Bewley's company was swept up in the merger that created The Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company. Until the mid-1900s, it was gutta-percha that protected the transatlantic cables used for communication. The resin from gutta-percha was used to make all kinds of items like buckets and mugs, soles for shoes, bands for heavy equipment, buoys, and so forth. Early on, the uses for gutta-percha seemed endless - but its original use as tubing (thanks to Bewley) was vital for scientists and engineers working with wiring, liquids, and gases. Gardeners owed a debt of g