INTRODUCTION 
A PRIL 15, 1917, will go down as one of the most 
• momentous days in American history, quite apart 
from the fact that it marked our entrance into the World 
War. It will be remembered by gardeners throughout the 
land as the day when the President asked every other 
citizen to recognize the importance of home gardening as 
a means to help feed the world. Several weeks before 
then had marked the spiritual birth of this book. 
The following pages are intended primarily to give 
reliable guidance to the millions of new-born gardeners who 
have never used a spade, a rake, or a hoe. Plow to perform 
the many simple little acts, the sum total of which con- 
stitutes the fine art of gardening, is plainly told through 
words and pictures. 
Rather unusual efforts have been made to have the 
pictures tell the story wherever possible. Often they 
illustrate how the work should be done, how the plants 
develop, and what the fully-grown vegetables look like. 
It has taken the best part of ten years’ work in the author’s 
own home gardens to secure the majority of the pictures 
used in illustrating this book, which is the most com- 
prehensive pictorial presentation of vegetable growing 
attempted to date. 
Wherever practicable and possible, definite information is 
given as to time of maturity of different sorts, their 
adaptability to different soils and sections, and their 
general behavior under normal conditions. This will 
cause the book to be equally welcomed by the experienced 
gardener in search of dependable information on the much 
neglected question of varieties. “Which kinds and why” 
