. . . while watching the evening news, I
suddenly heard the name of an online friend. There had
been a shooting in Redding, California, 200 miles (322 km)
from our home. My wife and I were shocked as the story
unfolded about the religion-inspired hate crime linked to
the bombing of a local synagogue. To the surprise of my
wife, I explained that I had an email relationship with
one of the victims - Gary Matson - who was a well-known
member of this forum.
Gary and I had just a day before exchanged some emails
on topics of our shared interests - plants, botany,
education, teaching. I was inspired by his projects in
this northern corner of our giant Central Valley, at one
of the extremities of our Californian mediterranean
climate region. We shared similar ideas and encouraged
each other. I could not believe that he was now gone and
under such troubling circumstances.
Gary, and his partner, Winfield Mowder, knew their
killers well, even helping them set up a stand at the
local farmer's market. The Redding community was shocked
at the loss of these two visionary men whose contribution
to the community is still felt today. They also were
given pause by how successfully their killers had
concealed their inner feelings of hate.
For at least a decade, while searching through my
copious emails in search of something in particular, I
might stumble upon my many rich exchanges with Gary.
Rereading their content, I was often re-inspired in my own
efforts, in my own life. While I culled old emails that
were no longer needed (we were concerned about space usage
in those days), I always made sure to keep those from
Gary. When the email system I was using ultimately was
replaced by something newer, I made efforts to archive my
old emails - unfortunately, and sadly, they were
ultimately lost.
Some of you may recall Gary and his contributions to
this group in the late 1990s. I searched for 'Gary
Matson' in the online archive of this forum -
hort.net - you can do the
same if you wish:
https://www.hort.net/lists/medit-plants/search.pl
(be sure and check 'Search all years'). This archive,
unfortunately, does not (yet) contain all the posts from
the group's inception a few years prior to 1997, including
many from Gary.
For more information about this very sad event, and
Gary and Winfield's life and contributions, see the
following links.
https://web.archive.org/web/20000229034244/http://www.garysgarden.com/GaryMarcia.htm
(a short write-up from Gary's ex-wife, Marcia Howe,
courtesy of the Internet Archive's 'Way-Back Machine')
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Gary_Matson_and_Winfield_Mowder
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/The-Representative-Murder-of-Gary-Matson-and-Winfield-Mowder_tbl5_276597228
