PORT NECHES — Walter Newby opened his back door and called for his dog Peggy, who promptly jumped up onto her owner’s yard tractor, ready for a ride.

The destination — the garden, where corn as high as 11-foot tall towers over okra, eggplant, bell peppers, tomatoes and more.

“Every stalk has two ears on it,” Newby, 85, said proudly from his seat on the tractor that he uses to get around on in the yard. “People say they have never seen corn this tall in Texas.”

Friends Gene Marsh and Chuck Land come over periodically and help the retiree with the garden that now has a special rig of poles and twine to keep the stalks from falling over.

Originally from Oklahoma, Newby’s family moved to Kansas during World War II then to Lake Charles, Louisiana where his dad was a city service worker. After high school, Newby moved to Port Arthur, where he worked at Texaco for 36 years. He later owned Newby Motors on Ninth Avenue in Port Arthur and even had a garden at that location.

Marsh, his neighbor, has been helping him with the garden for some years now.

“He (Newby) said he wanted to have a little garden and I’d had one for years now. I roto-tilled one up for him, planted it on a small strip of land so he could get to on his tractor. Then he wanted to expand it,” Marsh said with a laugh. “Now there’s two narrow strips of land. I roto-tilled it, planted it, got it going good. Originally he was supposed to water and take care of it but he’s gotten a little older now. He loves to see it grow. He loves to be outside.”

Newby’s current garden also has an abundance of cherry tomatoes that need to be picked daily as well as regular tomatoes, cucumbers and onions and he recently harvested potatoes.

Newby says he inherited his green thumb from his momma.

“She could plant a broom stick and it would raise brooms,” Newby said.

The key to the success of his garden is a full eight hours of sunshine and plenty of water from his well, though this year’s garden, for some reason, is producing more than ever before.

“Eight hours of sunshine and a garden needs a lot of water. I have a well,” he said. “I watch it (garden) grow, fertilize it, water it and give it away.”

He said he spends a lot of time outdoors in the garden and prefers this to sitting inside the house being bored.