San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
‘Papa’ Prevo growing more than crops
Gardner teaches community how to raise own food in a space called Heavenly Gardens, which is nestled behind Redeeming Grace Church on Foster Road
Clarence “Papa” Prevo rises early to work two acres of fertile ground, just as he did on his family’s farm outside Selma, Alabama.
He wears a weathered straw hat to shade his face from the blazing hot sun and pelting rain as he walks and talks to the plants. Sometimes he wears a blue ball cap with the words “Mr. Fix-It” on the crown.
The football-field-sized garden is lush and abundant. The scent of mint leaves, low near the entrance, hangs in the air. Blooms, stalks and fan-sized leaves dangle from burrowed rows of black soil lining the green space.
Gingerly, he pulls robust fruit and vegetables that he grows not for show or prizes but for sustenance and good health. He produces more than 50 different types of crops. Corn. Bell peppers. Tomatoes. Mustard and collard greens. Okra. Potatoes. Kale. Bananas. Squash. Zucchini. Eggplants. Celery. Onions.
For Prevo, 82, it’s a calling. “I guess you could say it’s in my DNA,” the gardener said.
Each day, the son of a sharecropper shares his knowledge of growing plants on land called Heavenly Gardens.
For the past five years, Prevo and volunteers have tended to the community garden nestled behind Redeeming Grace Church, 4500 N. Foster Road.
His ministry is teaching people how to grow their own healthy food in a natural green space that’s heavenly, he says, like the Garden of Eden.
The fresh vegetables and fruit are available to the public at a discounted price. And the purchase comes with a lesson from Prevo about how the crops are grown.
Heavenly Gardens
For two consecutive years, San Antonio residents have voted it Community Garden of the Year in a contest sponsored by Gardopia Gardens.
Prevo, a parishioner at Redeeming Grace, has a team of trusted helpers who toil by his side. They affectionately call him “Papa.”
Many volunteers are young women and retirees who arrive early to harvest the crops.
They show up bundled in sweatpants, scarves and hoodies, treading across the damp
soil in boots.
“People come into your life for a reason, a season or for a lifetime,” Prevo said. “I think it’s divine intervention. People come and contribute to the growth in their way.”
Prevo met his public relations manager and fellow congregation member, Twyla Varnado, during her time of need. He affectionally calls her “Tweety Bird.”
In the spring of 2014, she had finished chemotherapy for stage four colon and liver cancer. Prevo would stop by her house, drop off bottles of green vegetable juice, ring her doorbell and leave.
“I know that was what helped me,” Varnado, 60, said. “It was all nutritious, all from his garden.”
When Varnado started her own garden, Prevo brought her 12 big containers of different plants. In August 2015, when she moved to another home, Prevo supplied 40 more plants.
In October 2017, Prevo started the community garden with plants from his home and Fort Sam Houston. Varnado volunteered to help him.
She posts videos and photos on their Facebook and Instagram page named heavenly_gardens1. Each day, Varnado narrates clips with the greeting, “Good Heavenly Gardens morning to you!”
Curiosity prompted a visit by a neighbor, C. J. Embry, who had seen the green space as she drove past the church. She was born and raised in Florida on a farm, so seeing the garden was like being home.
Recently, she stopped by the Northeast Side orchard, and Prevo invited her to see the crops. He showed her around
the garden, the corn field maze and the yield of tomatoes.
“You sure are making that tomato look good,” she said as Prevo plucked one. “It makes me want to bite it.”
“Why do you think I pulled it off ?” he said.
She ate the tomato fresh off of the vine.
“This is just like heaven to me,” Embry said. “Seeing him was a blessing. He made my day.”
Longtime volunteer and team member Natisha Loving, 35, said when she spreads produce on the table, her youngest daughter eats the vegetables for snacks. Her time in the green space is her prayer time.
“I work the garden, and each task is an opportunity to evaluate myself spiritually,” Loving said. “When I plant seeds, I pray for my children and the next season of their life.”
Since the age of 6
Prevo was one of eight children. Growing plants has been his passion since he was 6 years old and tended his own small garden. He was 12 when his mother let him help at his grandfather’s farm, plowing the fields. At 17, his grandfather died, and he headed to the city to live with his aunt and uncle.
He kept a garden in the backyard.
Prevo was 20 when he enlisted in the Army for better opportunities.
He took his gardening skills with him.
While stationed at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington, D.C., he started a garden in a space offered by a neighbor. He created his first garden in San Antonio in 1972 while stationed at Fort Sam Houston. He planted
seeds of plants like broccoli, cauliflower and kale, produce he’d never grown in Alabama.
After he retired as a sergeant major, Prevo started the garden with the blessing from Bishop Brent M. Bryant of Redeeming Grace. Prevo gives all of the credit to a higher power.
“I didn’t get this idea on my own. God gave it to me,” Prevo said. “He put in my heart to do this thing. He’s been doing it ever since in a bountiful way.”
His family and wife, Barbara Ann Prevo, support his passion. Every day she brings whatever he needs, whether it’s breakfast, lunch or tea. She takes care of tasks at home, freeing him up to focus on the garden.
“I appreciate all that she does,” he said. “It’s a sacrifice, and I appreciate that.”
Learning, producing
Like his garden, Prevo keeps growing. He constantly seeks ways to improve his crops, viewing videos of new methods on YouTube. He doesn’t use pesticides — everything is natural.
“If you notice, in nature, they don’t use chemicals,” Prevo said. “The leaves fall down in the fall, decompose in the spring, rain comes, creates some juice and goes back into the soil, and by the spring, they got their fertilizer.”
Much of the recycled fixtures are donated items. Neighbors brought old fence boards that serve as borders along raised beds. Old containers are reused as planters. They’ve used old ice chests with holes poked in the bottom,
They have 227 containers, coolers, toy bins, wash machine tubs and recycling bins.
They have made 332 raised beds from recycled wooden fences, doors and twin bed frames.
Just like in the country
Prevo started with inground planting. He progressed to using raised beds in containers, like gardeners he’d seen online.
“If you have bad soil,” Prevo said, “you rise above it.”
Wood chips scattered across the pathways keep moisture in the soil and make walking easier after it rains.
He uses compost with plants, horse manure and hay from a local stable. When he started, donors from the stable tilled the hard ground with a tractor to make it easier for Prevo to plant his seeds.
Recently, the master gardener walked through rows more than 11 feet high of corn stalks, lost in the foliage. He pulled cobs of sweet corn and a variety called “peaches and cream” and broke pieces in half for visitors to taste.
Varnado said the white and yellow corn is a popular choice when it’s in season.
The long stalks of corn rise high beyond a wood latticework fence that fronts his workshop. It’s where Varnado’s iPad plays Prevo’s theme song — “Just Me and My Plants,” by music artist Rocco Elliot.
The song, Varnado said, goes along with everything happening in the gardens. The tune talks about not overwatering to prevent root rot. There’s a line about people who have stolen crops, like what happened at Heavenly Gardens in the past. They built a fence to keep interlopers out.
Peace and serenity
Prevo’s mission is to share his knowledge with guests, especially the little ones.
He wants to prepare future generations who will live in a world of climate change, much different from the weather patterns of his past.
Prevo has mentored youngsters who were home-schooled, young people who studied at universities and older adults schooled in the ways of a world lost in time.
The garden, he said, is his retirement home, his legacy.
“The thing about gardening is it’s peaceful,” Prevo said. “I got peace out here and serenity.”