Growing a legacy: Grounds superintendent recognized for cultivating new oak at children’s park
On Nov. 4, Fred Lincoln’s friends, family and colleagues gathered at Magnolia Manor to surprise the grounds crew superintendent. During a ceremony, hospital leaders praised him and his staff for all they do to make Geri Moulton Children’s Park a place of serenity and hope.
By Casandra Andrews
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It started with a tiny acorn and a little gumption. Four years ago, Fred Lincoln, the grounds superintendent at USA Health Children’s & Women’s Hospital, decided to try his hand at plant propagation.
He wanted to see if he could take an acorn from a more than 300-year-old live oak and nurture the nut so that it would eventually blossom into a sapling.
So, he gathered a few acorns from the ground just below the Spanish-moss-drenched branches of a towering oak that stands near the entrance to USA Health Mitchell Cancer Institute within the Geri Moulton Children’s Park.
He placed the acorns into small pots filled with nutrient-rich soil and set them up outside on a patch of pavement a few blocks away on USA Health’s midtown campus. Then, he set about caring for the acorns that eventually sprouted into seedlings.
"I really just wanted to see if I could do it,” Lincoln said recently, reflecting on the accomplishment. “Our grounds department really deserves a round of applause, too, for what they do in the park.”
Along the way, the fledgling trees weathered Mobile’s torrential rains, tropical storms and even the historic snowfall that blanketed the city in January 2025.
Lincoln said he worried the young oaks would not make it through those icy conditions, but he chose not to cover them because they would need to survive such extremities once they were replanted in the park.
The tough love paid off.
The sturdy tree made it through the snowstorm and everything else Mother Nature threw its way. Nearly two years later, Lincoln and colleague Michael Harris found the perfect spot for the planting that is now known as the legacy oak.
Under cloudy skies, Lincoln and Harris plunged shovels into the earth, digging a large hole for the tree that has grown to some 4 feet tall. The men rolled the tree in its container over to the hole, sprinkling a secret sauce of fertilizer into the dirt before replanting the oak in a spot surrounded by cedars, magnolias and bronze statues of children at play.
“We thought it would be nice to have a canopy of oaks along the street,” Lincoln said, gesturing to the winding road that leads to the hospital. “I won’t see it in my lifetime, but I wanted something to leave behind.”
Unbeknownst to Lincoln, plans were underway for a special ceremony a few days later to recognize him for the work he has accomplished in the park and surrounding green spaces. A bronze plaque is being created to be permanently placed by the tree to mark his legacy.
On Nov. 4, Lincoln’s friends, family and colleagues gathered at nearby Magnolia Manor to surprise him. During a ceremony, hospital leaders praised him and the grounds crew for all they do to make the park a place of serenity and hope.
"Fred nursed the small oak, tending to it, for it to grow for the next 100 years,” said Deborah Browning, MSN, RN, CENP, chief executive officer for Children’s & Women’s Hospital. “This oak will tell the story of Fred and his grounds crew – every one of them – who work each day to make the park such a special place for our patients, their families and our staff.”
After the ceremony, Lincoln and members of the grounds crew were the guests of honor at a special lunch hosted by Geri Moulton in her home. Moulton, wife of the late Gordon Moulton – the University of South Alabama’s second president – worked tirelessly to fill the park with statues and native plants before and after its opening in 2001.
