112 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [P. D. 4. 



WAR SERVICE THROUGH FOOD CONSERVATION. 



SARAH LOUISE ARNOLD. 



This paper is intended to present a summary of experience 

 gathered in deahng intimately with the women of Massachu- 

 setts in the various appeals made by the government for co- 

 operation in food economy. These appeals for co-operation 

 have to be interpreted and applied to groups differing widely 

 in circumstances and abilities. The city dweller who lives from 

 hand to mouth, having no storage facilities, depending upon the 

 market or the corner grocerj^ and upon a limited weekly in- 

 come, cannot deal with food conservation on the basis which 

 must be accepted by the farmer's wife, isolated on the hills of 

 the country town. Furthermore, in any given community con- 

 ditions are likewise dissimilar. The average homekeeper, feed- 

 ing her family from an average income and preparing all the 

 food which is set upon her table, differs from the mother in the 

 crowded tenement who buys most of her food from the delica- 

 tessen, and on the other hand from the head of the house 

 whose administration involves employing from five to fifteen 

 servants. 



Yet the purpose of the government is to inform, to persuade 

 and to win the co-operation of every woman in the community. 

 Some headway has been made in this campaign, and this paper 

 will attempt to set forth the various problems presented, the 

 progress which seems to have been made and the outlook 

 ahead. 



As will be remembered, when Washington declared that food 

 will win the war the announcement was dimly understood. It 

 had not the familiar sound of the slogan as we hear it to-day, 

 or the familiar aspect as we read it, facing us at every street 

 corner and even upon the envelopes which enclose our morning's 



