RIP Old Friend

Edwin Gardner

<!-- Edwin Gardner -->http://mi-cache.legacy.com/legacy/im...788_203028.jpg Edwin Gardner CHARLESTON - Edwin Gardner, 64, a devoted father and husband who worked as a writer, teacher, dolphin trainer, community advocate, and planner for his native state of Tennessee, died Friday, July 23, from injuries sustained when his bicycle and an SUV collided. Edwin Sumner Gardner V was born in Nashville, Tenn., on Sept. 19, 1945, to Edwin Sumner Gardner IV and Grace Olive Daniel Gardner. His father was the longtime treasurer of Vanderbilt University. He attended Phillips Academy, Andover, and then the University of the South, Sewanee, and Vanderbilt, where he studied with the Fugitive Poets and Southern Agrarians. He placed a short story in the Sewannee Review, edited by the Agrarian writer Andrew Lytle. After teaching high school English in Washington, D.C., he started an educational program at the Dolphin Research Center in Marathon, Fla., and moved to Charleston in 1992, where he was the first development director for the South Carolina Aquarium. Gardner was involved with the Outward Bound program in its early development in America, and was an accomplished kayaker at a time when the most common way to acquire a kayak was to build one. In 1995, Gardner founded the New Charleston Mosquito Fleet to reconnect inner city children with Charleston's history of boat building and boating. He was president of the Harleston Village Neighborhood Association and a leader on the transportation subcommittee of the Peninsula Task Force. As founder of the Heritage Strategy Group, he wrote plans for recreational areas and scenic byways, balancing conservation and business interests. He was the primary author of the Tennessee 2020 Vision for Parks and Landscape that is the state's principal park planning document. Survivors include his wife, Whitney Powers, daughter Olive Kesler Powers Gardner, sisters Gretchen Gardner of Ann Arbor, Mich., and Patricia Campbell of Nashville.

This is one of my wife's and my oldest friends. I include this post to memorialize his passing and to remind each one of us of the gift and fragility of life. All too often, it is unsung heroes like Ed who somehow do what they do with dignity and silence.

Next time you see a bicyclist on the road and consider your next move, remember he is much more vulnerable than you. Share the road fairly, and be careful. You may not be killed, but your life will be forever changed if things go wrong.

Wow. He sounds like he was a wonderful man. I'm so sorry for your loss.

I'm very sorry to hear of your loss, Auri. It would seem the entire community shall miss Mr. Gardner and his contributions.

I'm sorry. He sounds like a true Humanitarian, who touched a lot of lives. I didn't know him, but I'm sad to see him go. From what you've written, I would have been honored if he called me "friend". I'm sure you are.

Sorry for your loss Nickles and thanks for sharing. It's always hard when someone is taken from us by "accident" at too early an age. "Yes, life is indeed sweet when one cannot have it." But I prefer to lift my glass and laugh and try to remember the good times I had with the person. Keep them alive with a smile. That helps me. Take care friend and be well.

Worf

Sorry for your loss.

Yes, that's a sobering obit. The wife and I have only recently taken up cycling in the last three months or so as a means of staying in shape and we've already had two close calls with unappologetic, preoccupied motorists. The priviledge of driving is so second nature and we seldom give the slightest pause for non-motorists, failing to realize we're operating a torpedo on wheels.

Its a shame to see "one of the good ones" taken out in such a manner when it prolly could have easily been avoided. We need more people like that in our world, not fewer.

my condolences on the loss of your friend. Your post is an excellent and moving memorial.