184 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



May, 1918 



woman who can hut does not work with her hands this 

 yeat is not a woman. She is just a thing — an irresponsible, 

 pitiful thing. 



Miss Florence King, prominent woman 

 attorney of Chicago and president of the 

 Women's Chamber of Commerce of the 

 United States, is one of the leaders among 

 women in this work. She organized classes 

 for the instruction of women in driving farm 

 tractors and a large number of women, 

 many of them already experts at handling 

 automobiles, responded to her call. 



In Boston the Women's Municipal League 

 conducted an intensive campaign to arouse 

 the interest of the people in war gardening. 

 The National War Garden Commission sent 

 thousands of its books of instruction on 

 gardening, canning, and drying, and stor- 

 age of vegetables and fruits to clubs and 

 organizations all over the country for dis- 



5 ffl 

 iniiiHiimirEimi!!!! !l |&Ti 



Hundreds of employees in industrial plants all over the country turned in with a will 

 the armies of the Allies. Employees of the Oliver Chilled Plow 



Not only were supplies raised for immediate use but the surplus crop handled in 

 cooperative canning works was saved in many a community. The canning kitchen at 

 Hamilton and Wenham, Mass. 



Power tractors and gang plows at work on land never before cultivated. More than 60 

 acres of land plowed and set aside for employees by the General Electric Company, 

 Schenectady, New York. Individual allotments were 50 x 75 ft. 



tribution to the city farmers and to help 

 in conserving the products of the garden. 



Cities and Towns Line Up 



*~pO NAME the cities and towns where war 

 *■ gardening has taken a strong hold 

 would be to give a roster of nearly every 

 place in the United States. In Cincinnati 

 the work has been carried on under the 

 competent supervision of Mrs. L. D. Drewry, 

 with Mrs. Samuel Taft and Miss Mildred 

 Shillito as two of her active assistants. In 

 Indianapolis the big drive into the garden 

 trenches was made under the direction of 

 Harry Miesse, secretary of the Patriotic 

 Gardeners' Association; in Newark, N. J., 

 through the Vacant Lot and Yard Improve- 

 ment Association, Carl Bannwart, president; 

 in Atlanta with Mrs. Spencer R. Atkinson, 

 president of the City Federation of Women's 

 Clubs, handling the details and with the 

 Chamber of Commerce and numerous other 

 bodies and individuals backing the movement; 

 in Kansas City, with E. R. de Vigne, Commis- 

 sioner of Agriculture for that District, in 

 charge; in Denver, under the supervision of 

 P. L. Clarke. 



States where the population is dense and 

 where cities and towns are near each other 

 have been turned into practically one big war 

 garden. In Connecticut the Fairfield County 

 Association for the Mobilization of Resources 

 distributed more than a hundred thousand 

 copies of the Commission's garden book among 

 the employees of the factories which abound 



in that busy territory. In this way many of 

 the workers in munition factories have been 

 doing double service for their country. They 

 have been helping in the manufacture of guns 

 and of implements of war and at the same 

 time during their spare hours they have been 

 raising food — that other ammunition which 

 is just as important and as vital to success in 

 the war as guns and bullets. 



Home Gardeners to Feed the Army 



/^\NE OF the big helps to this class of 

 ^-^ workers this year, and in fact to all 

 war gardeners, has been the adoption of Day- 

 light Saving, which had the hearty backing 

 of the Commission. This extra hour of day- 

 light in the afternoon means to the home 

 food producers a tremendous increase in the 

 output from the back yard munition plants. 

 It means an increase of from 25 to 50 per cent, 

 in the amount of food grown. More intensive 

 cultivation of the home plot can be carried on 

 than would have been possible under the old 

 time system. Daylight Saving adds more 

 than 300,000 years of actual working time to 

 the war gardeners' work. In seven months of 

 26 working days each it gives to each 1,000,000 

 war gardeners a total of 182,000,000 hours, 

 or 22,750,000 days of 8 hours each. 



Conservative estimates show that 5,000,000 

 gardeners can produce the equivalent of 

 enough food to sustain 1,000,000 soldiers 

 for 238 days, or almost eight months. The 

 additional power which daylight saving gives 

 them means that they can increase this to ten 



months; and perhaps supply to the nation's 

 larder the equivalent of all the food needed by the 

 American Army, which will be in France before 

 the end of this year, for a full twelve months. 



Daylight Saving had proved a valuable 

 adjunct to the war preparations of other 

 countries before the United States began to 

 consider its adoption. Fourteen countries 

 already had adopted it. Germany was the 

 first. It was put into operation there shortly 

 after the outbreak of the war. The other bel- 

 ligerents and a number of the neutrals fol- 

 lowed. It was successful and satisfactory 

 wherever tried. Workers and other classes 

 of the populations were pleased with the sum- 

 mer innovation which not only effected im- 

 portant savings but gave them more time in 

 the open. 



On this account and because of the realiza- 

 tion that it would be of great assistance to 

 the war gardeners of the United States, the 

 movement here received the strong endorse- 

 ment and the complete support of the Na- 

 tional War Garden Commission. ■ That results 

 will justify this stand there is no doubt. 



No single measure that could be adopted, 

 in the opinion of the Commission, would do 

 more to increase food production via the back 

 yard and vacant lot. Firm in this belief, the 

 Commission did all it could to further the 

 passage of the daylight-saving bill. Both the 

 Senate and the House committees which had 

 charge of the bill also emphasized the impor- 

 tant part that this pushing of the clock an 

 hour ahead during the summer months would 



