‘A living memory’ — Neighbors saving the plants of Lincoln’s Wayne Manor

Bill had been a geologist and taught at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Naomi taught physical education and coached at Norris High School after they moved here in 1968, a woman who could still touch her toes at 97, and a world-class gymnast as a young woman.

She and Bill were a match.

They met in college in Bloomington, Indiana. Naomi was a lifeguard at the local pool. Bill was a romantic who whistled love songs underneath her window at the boarding house.

They married and bought 14 acres outside Bloomington. They raised Nancy and John and Annette there. They grew an enormous garden and planted perennials around the house Bill built with his own hands.

They loved the outdoors and each other.

When they landed in Lincoln, they danced at every street party and polkaed in the living room of their stately two-story in the Near South neighborhood.

Their yard was a bouquet of color from the first daffodils to the last aster.

They died six months apart.

And now their house has a new owner.

A woman who lives kitty corner down the block in a stately old house of her own.

Carmen Maurer is preserving the Waynes’ house in the Mount Emerald Historic District of the city. A show home when it was built 115 years ago — a model to attract owners to the neighborhood.

She’s preserving the yard, too, spreading the world of beauty that Naomi and Bill so loved across the city and beyond.

Maurer is standing in the yard of the home she calls Wayne Manor on a steamy Thursday morning.

She points to a plant with oval-shaped seed pods, thin as waxed paper.

“That’s a money plant.”

She finds a delicate lavender flower peeking out from phlox and the wild pink roses.

“That’s called Virginia Waterleaf. Isn’t that the best name ever?”

Like a movie star, she says. Hello, I’m Virginia Waterleaf.

Maurer is soon-to-be-retired from the in-house legal staff at the University of Nebraska. She has two cats and a daughter. She’s chatty and passionate.

She’s especially passionate about this neighborhood.

“First of all, I really think the preservation of core neighborhoods is critical to the health of a city,” she says. “Core neighborhoods are the heart of the city.”

Maurer has lived in her own two-story brick beauty for 14 years. It didn’t need a lot of work when she moved in. Cosmetic stuff, mostly.

“But I’ve always been interested in restoring a house.”

She bought Bill and Naomi’s house last October.

She’s knee-deep in shining it up from the inside out. Removing wallpaper. Cleaning out the chimney. Painting. Repairing. Updating the electrical panel. Expanding the kitchen.

“It’s a project on the inside and then there is this wild and wonderful yard.”

Maurer recognized the beauty in that yard. All the love and care the Waynes had given it over the decades.

And the importance of saving it.

But she also envisioned something tamer in the after photos of her restoration. Something more traditional and manicured. A yard with grass, edged in flowers.

She told Bill and Naomi’s children about her plans.

“We had a number of discussions and I let them know it was my plan to be respectful of the house in its entirety.”

She wanted them to know she would save as many plants as possible.

“As a living memory.”

Naomi and Bill were good neighbors.

And they were good stewards of the Earth, too.

They grew milkweed as a pollinator and every kind of vegetable under the sun. They planted shrubs and vines and hundreds of species of plants.

They planted a sassafras tree like the one they had back on their land in Indiana and made sassafras tea.

They never installed central air in their home and loved to cook and eat outdoors.

Bill rode a bicycle to work at the university, built special for him by his son John.

The couple walked to the grocery store. They walked to the library.

“They had dandelion salad anytime there were dandelions,” said their oldest daughter, Nancy Scott. “They were eating lamb’s quarters all summer long.”

The couple camped and explored until Naomi got tired of sleeping on a thin pad on the ground and then they traveled the West in their little camper, said daughter-in-law Teresa Wayne.

“They went fishing and Bill loved to find the rocks,” she said.

Bill died first, in November 2019; Naomi six months later.

Wayne thinks of them sitting on that porch on C Street every day for more than half a century, sharing a meal, enjoying each other’s company.

“Looking at their beautiful yard.”

The digging began in April.

Neighbors who knew and cared about the couple came and transplanted favorite flowers into their yards.

“They were a sweet couple,” said Jeff Cole from next door. “Really nice, interesting and interested people. We miss them.”

Volunteers from the Near South Neighborhood Association came and dug plants for its annual plant sale on the first of May.

“So those plants now have found nice homes,” Maurer said.

Leftover plants from the sale found their way to the Wilken family’s driveway on A Street for the annual Near South garage sale, too.

The money from the Waynes’ plants — and others — will go to help restore Peach Park, one of seven in the neighborhood.

“It’s a group effort,” Cathay Wilken said. “Good for all of us.”

Perennials from the Waynes’ yard will live on in the landscaping of two low-income apartment buildings near the Capitol, too.

Favorite plants went home with all of Bill and Naomi’s children and the grands and great-grands, too.

And more plants — dug by neighbors and identified by plant people — are in the custody of Marv Maurer, Carmen’s dad, until the yard is ready for new flower beds.

“He’s watering them and keeping them alive,” Maurer said.

She’s hoping the house will attract a new set of “old-house people.” People who will be good stewards of its history and fill it with new memories.

In the meantime, the neighborhood has come together to support the project.

It’s all in the tradition of the Near South, she said.

“It’s a neighborhood in the true sense of the word.”