BOARDS of Educa- 

 tion, school garden 

 organizers, and all 

 who are interested 

 in putting through the 

 best possible war gardens, 

 should note carefully the 

 personnel of the war garden committee of the 

 Illinois State Council of Defense. It has proved 

 itself so very effective. Judging from results, it 

 would be well if in all our cities the garden com- 

 mittee were made up on the same lines. 



These are the members of the Chicago Commit- 

 tee: Robert B. Beach, Chicago Association of 

 Commerce; Joseph Budlong, Truck Gardener; 

 John C. Cannon, Lincoln Park Commissioners; 

 Walter E. Dorland, Boy Scouts of America; 

 J. F. Foster, South Park Commissioners; August 

 Geweke, Truck Gardener; J. A. Hillier, Y. M. C. 

 A.; P. G. Holden, Director Agricultural Exten- 

 sion Dept. International Harvester Co. N. J.; 

 Brother Justus, Arch-Diocese, Chicago; A. R. 

 Mariott, Chicago Title & Trust Co.; B. J. Mul- 

 laney, Publicity; Mrs. Augustus Peabody, Wo- 

 men's Food Production Committee; J. H. Prost, 

 Director of Gardens; Mrs. Louise O. Rowe, Dept. 

 of Public Welfare, City of Chicago; A.C. Schrader, 

 West Side Park Commissioners; John D. Shoop, 

 Chicago Public Schools; Thomas Skompa, 

 Northwest Park Commissioners, Leonard 

 Vaughan, Seedsman; Harry A. Wheeler, U. S. 

 Food Administrator for Illinois. 



Observe the business men and the truck gar- 

 deners and seedsman, the clergy and the Boy 

 Scouts and the Y. M. C. A., the publicity man, 

 the International Harvester, and the Public Wel- 

 fare, the Park Commissioners — and only one 

 from the schools! Here was an admirable work- 

 ing organization that could tackle every phase of 

 garden production. 



Very early in the spring, a definite programme 

 was formulated and this programme was adhered 

 to closely. Here it is; together with the way it 

 was worked out: 



I. To distribute gardening information by daily news bulletins; 

 (Official bulletins published in four of the daily papers, 225 news- 

 paper stories on gardening — total press clippings, 350). By 

 primers (100,000 Garden Primers distributed free, 50,000 primers 

 sold at $5.00 per M.) By practical instructions (4,000 "Grow a 

 Vegetable Garden" by the International Harvester Co. distrib- 

 uted, 3,oco Natl. War Garden Commission primers, 3,000 Illi- 

 nois University Garden Bulletins; 5,000 Trade Catalogues on 

 seeds, fertilizers, spraying materials, etc.) 



By lectures (A short course of gardening was given by the gar- 

 den committee, about eighty of the total attendance volunteered 

 their services to do talking before clubs and factory groups — 

 Number of lectures 682). 



By posters and signs (10.000 War Garden posters donated and 

 distributed free, 17,000 Garden Signs distributed free). 



By demonstration gardens (These were established to the num- 

 ber of seventeen in the large parks, by the Park Commissioners. 

 They were vegetable gardens which afforded practical demon- 

 strations of how and what to do in the garden and when to do it. 

 These demonstrations were conducted by the Head Gardeners 

 of the parks, and by lecturers sent out by the Garden Committee). 



II. To record donations of cultivatable property and assign same to 

 applicants requesting gardens. (2,200 acres of vacant and idle 

 land was donated for War Garden purposes, most of which was 

 turned over to the local gardening associations. Nine hundred 

 people requested land and were assigned lots through this Garden 

 Committee, 2,000 people were referred to the garden organiza- 

 tions covering the territory in which they lived). 



III. To carry on gardening campaigns through organizations, and 

 to further organize clubs in territories where none existed. 



This was one of the most valuable points of the Chicago Com- 

 mittee's programme. The Committee corresponded with and 

 furnished garden information to about 300 improvement asso- 

 ciations, 60 of these became definitely affiliated with the War 

 Garden Committee, carried on a definite campaign and covered a 

 prescribed area of the city. The largest and oldest of the affili- 

 ating organizations are shown in the table in the next column. 



There was a total of 8,422 registered Association gardeners 

 and 744 acres cultivated. The other associations have smaller 

 community gardens on vacant lots. By the cooperation of these 

 associations the seeker after garden information could have 

 help from the nearest source of wisdom. 



IV. To furnish plowing, harrowing, fertilizer, tools, seeds, seedling 

 plants, onion sets, etc., to organizations and to citizens at cost, free 

 of charge where possible. 



The different Park Commissioners and the Chicago Florists' 

 Club grew and distributed plants through the War Garden Com- 

 mittee to the number of 1,500,000. 



V. To have a map of Chicago, showing on the same territories covered 



t garden organizations and the schools having school gar- 

 dens. 



This wai done, each organization assuming charge of its sec- 

 tion, and afforded a fine example of how to avoid overlapping and 

 duplicating of work. 



VI. To encourage and supervise children's school gardens and home 

 garden:, public schools, parochial schools, and private institutions. 



I In-, work was und<r the direction of the "Women's Direct- 

 ing Committee for Children's War Gardens." The Committee 

 d\ follows: Mrs. Augustus Pea body, Mrs. Joseph T. Bowen, 

 Mrs. Cyrus H. McCormick, Mrs. Wm. S. Hcfferan, Mrs. Tif- 

 fany Blake, Mrs. Robert P. Bates, Mrs. Robt. H. McCormick, 



UNCLE SAM'S GARDENING 



A News Feature of National Current Activities 



Chief Cooperating Organizations 



ORGANIZATIONS 



SERVING 



700 



1.300 



ISO 

 1,500 

 1,300 



500 



300 

 1,052 

 300 

 200 

 100 



60 

 500 



160 



300 



cultivating, 

 (acres) 



City Gardens Association 



Stockyards Community Clearing 



60 

 S° 

 IO 



Stock Yards C. C. H. (Boy 



So. Chicago Y. M. C. A 



Rogers Park Defense League. . . 

 Norwood Park Community Gns. 



West Pullman Y. M. C. A. Gar- 

 Boy Scouts of Chicago 



Avalon Park Civic Association . . 

 Austin Gardening Association . . 

 Salvation Army Gardening Asso- 



I20 

 I IO 



IOO 



IIO 



19 



20 



IS 



IO 



Pullman Co. Gardening Club. . . 

 Chicago Lawn Gardening Asso- 



80 



Northwest Park District 



40 



Mrs. Edward Gudeman, Mrs. Samuel T. Chase, Mrs. George A. 

 Ranney, Mrs. Walter S. Brewster. 



Numbers of amateur gardeners were enlisted in the work of 

 supervising the children's gardens, the women pledging to give 

 certain days or hours of the week and were assigned garden 

 responsibilities accordingly. If any lacked wisdom she could 

 ask of the Director, J. H. Prost. The schools reporting school 

 and home gardens were indicated on the map, and the women 

 ward garden leaders selected volunteers to help in directing and 

 in keeping the merit record which to child gardeners is all- 

 important. There were 90,000 child-gardeners, and placing 

 on each crop the extremely modest valuation (for full returns are 

 not yet in) the crop value will total $55,620. 



VII. To provide medals to the best children gardeners. 



Forty thousand United States School Garden Army insignia 

 bars have been distributed. A bronze medal will be furnished 

 by the Chicago Tribune to every juvenile gardener passing a mark 

 or 90, on the record book. The best boy and girl gardeners in 

 each school district, parochial school, or juvenile institution, will 

 be given a silver medal, also furnished by the Chicago Tribune. 



VIII. To direct a diyzvide prize garden contest. The Women's 

 War Garden Committee will award the War Garden prizes which 

 have been offered by the various corporations to the best garden- 

 ers entering these contests. 



The number of families having home yard gardens approximates 

 140,000. In the immediate suburbs of Chicago, crops are grown 

 on at least 90 per cent, of the vacant land. 



An approximate estimate of crops and crop-values given out by 

 the Committee, is as follows (and a very conservative estimate is 

 this, certain to be greatly surpassed when the actual figures are 

 all in). 





ACRES 



NUMBER OF 

 GARDENERS 



VALUE OF 

 CROP 



Home Yard Gardens 



Vacant Lot Community 



3,8so 



774 

 206 



140,000 



8,422 

 90,000 



$2,800,000 



673 ,760 

 55,620 



Children's Gardens 



Approximate Grand Totals 



4,830 



238,422 



$3,529,380 



Nearly 5,000 acres under cultivation, and three 

 and a half million dollars' worth of crops is a 

 record the Chicago Committee may well be proud 

 of. And admirable as this record is, it is not 

 exceptional, but typical of the best-managed 

 community gardening. But the cooperation 

 of parks, and florists' associations, the coopera- 

 tion of existing associations, the districting of 

 the city so that no labor might be wasted is well 

 worthy of attention. 



Many of the women of the Directing Commit- 

 tee for Children's War Gardens are also on the 

 committee of the excellently managed Illinois 

 Training Farm of the Women's Land Army of 

 America. Through the generosity of Mr. W. 

 V. B. Ames 200 acres of his Libertyville farm, be- 

 side some stock and the buildings, was tendered to 

 the Women's Land Army. Here a six months 

 training in farming, dairying, and poultry raising, 

 and vegetable gardening is given freely. The 

 applicant must be in good health, must promise 

 to use the training for the patriotic aims of the 

 Land Army, and must enroll until the end of 

 October. There are no expenses — no charge for 

 tuition, board, or lodging. 



There are plenty of untrained women eager to 

 work on farms and in gardens, but our crying 

 need is for trained help. It is this need that 

 "Liberty Farm" is planned to meet. Next 

 year its students can act as directors of children's 



94 



gardens for which posts 

 this year the supply was 

 unequal to the demand. 

 Mrs. Tiffany Blake is 

 chairman of the commit- 

 tee, others on it are Mrs. 

 W. V.B.Ames, Mrs. G. B. 

 B. Steward and Mrs.C.W. Deusner — both very able 

 members of the Women's National Farm & Gar- 

 den Association; Mrs. Peabody, Mrs. Brewster, 

 Mrs. Dunlap, Mrs. Medill McCormick, Dean 

 Mary Potter, Mrs. Cahn, Mrs. Charles Hubbard, 

 Mrs. Rosenstone, Mrs. Chase, Mrs. Stanley 

 Gordon, Mrs. Vibe K. Spicer, Miss Bell. Miss 

 Blanche Corwin is Farm Manager. 



This committee has also mothered a success- 

 ful Part-Time Work scheme, whereby women 

 who can give so many hours a week, may form a 

 Unit and cultivate a community garden under 

 competent supervision, so that next year all will 

 be fairly expert gardeners. More than 90 part- 

 time units have been formed throughout Illinois, 

 and the work has the approval of J. H. Prost, 

 director of the Chicago Committee, and like all 

 garden work in or near Chicago, it has had the 

 backing and aid of the central committee. 



In the enterprise of getting women workers 

 on to the land, far more is due to the pioneer 

 schools of horticulture for women than many 

 realize. If it had not been for the admirable 

 work done at the School of Horticulture for 

 Women at Ambler, Pa., and the School at Gro- 

 ton, Mass., we should indeed have been hard 

 put to it to find directors and supervisors for 

 various garden enterprises for women. These 

 schools, and especially the one at Ambler, blazed 

 the way, and made the success of many an under- 

 taking possible. 



Like the parks, which have been more use- 

 ful to the citizens than ever they dreamed of 

 before, the Public Schools are also making them- 

 selves useful as community centres. W. L. 

 Fleisher, New York Member of the American 

 Society of Heating and Ventilating Engineers, 

 asks "Why not use the public-schools as food- 

 drying plants — in New York City there is actual 

 apparatus to dry enough food to feed 2,000,000 

 men three meals every day? 



Our puhlic schools could easily be utilized for the country's food 

 needs. The walls of these buildings eliminate the necessity of a 

 great part of the kilns. The heating and ventilating systems could 

 be turned into dehydrating plants in very quick order. Of the 700 

 schools in Greater New York half have efficient ventilating equip- 

 ments — 10,500,000 cubic feet of air per minute in these 350 schools 

 can be heated to the right temperature. The products would be 

 500 pounds of dried material a minute, or 300,000 pounds per working 

 day often hours, the total amount of food per day for 2,000,000 men. 

 Basement corridors could be turned into tunnel dryers by means of 

 wooden partitions. The tunnel dryer, according to commercial 

 practice, is the very best and most economical made. I would have 

 the carriers or trays built by the boys of our manual training schools, 

 supplemented by outside labor, and would have'both our boys and 

 girls instructed in the preparation of the food and the drying. The 

 Government would ship to the schools the food to be dried and the 

 products could be made ready for shipment there. The school 

 dryers could also be used for drying the surplus domestic product 

 that the communities brought to the school. 



And while the school buildings were thus 

 employed the children could have their lessons in 

 the parks. It is probable they would highly ap- 

 prove of the scheme though whether the Board of 

 Education would do so, is another matter. The 

 suggestion makes one wonder, however, how 

 much "dehydrating" the children get in the 

 course of the school day? 



* * * 



Uncle Sam furnishes abundant information 

 as to canning and drying which may be had 

 from the National War Garden Commission, 

 and the States Relations Service, (Address Office 

 of Extension Work, North and West, Washing- 

 ton, D. C.) publishes excellent follow-up instruc- 

 tion leaflets for use in the Home Canning Club 

 work. The complete series may be had by 

 asking for the following under their cabalistic 

 signs NR-21, NR-22, NR-23, NR-24, NR-2S, 

 NR-26, NR-29, NR-30. 



Frances Duncan. 



