Planting Time In Avenue A Gardens, New York City, Which 
Are Cultivated Entirely bv Poor Children of the Tenements 
HOW THOSE CHILDREN WORK! 
S HE joy of green 
things growing 
is not the only 
thing implanted 
in the hearts and brains 
of those more than six 
hundred poor children of 
the tenements who till 
the little gardens over in 
New York’s Avenue A. Their ambition, too, is spurred by 
the competition of one with another to produce results in 
the form of flowers and crops. On that account they work 
with greater real energy and enthusiasm than the paid 
gardener who thinks more of the clock and what is to be 
in his envelope than of doing the most he can to encourage 
Nature in her labors. 
For the benefit of those readers of The Garden Magazine 
who are not familiar with the excellent work it advocated all last 
summer, a word of explanation may be necessary. The Avenue 
A Gardens are located on the extreme east side of New York, 
bordering one of its thickly populated tenement districts. Two 
blocks of unoccupied land are loaned by The Rockefeller 
Institute to the National Plant, Flower and Fruit Guild 
which in turn divides it into little planting spaces each 10x4 
feet. Each of these is allotted in the spring to a child of the 
tenements who prepares it for seeding, cultivates the planting 
through the summer, and in the fall has the crop for the 
consumption of his or her family. A competent instructor is 
provided and a man gardener sees that the children do their 
work in a practical way. 
Of course all this takes money. Last season the readers of 
The Garden Magazine sent in checks in liberal amounts, 
apparently realizing, whether they were New Yorkers or not, 
that here was not only a child charity of value but a means of 
turning what might become detrimental into good material for 
American citizenry. In fact, whole families have learned 
through these little gardens to love delving in the earth and have 
left their tenement habitations to become dwellers in the sub¬ 
urbs where they could have their bit of ground. 
It costs ten dollars for each garden to provide tools, seeds and 
instruction. The donor of that amount, or multiples of it, is 
entitled to name the garden or gardens provided for. These 
names have been chosen as memorials, to inspire the interest of 
other more fortunate children or to express the donor’s fancy. 
Checks may be sent through The Garden Magazine which 
will acknowledge them in its pages, or direct totheNational Plant, 
Flower and Fruit Guild, 70 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 
Contributions of ten dollars each have already been received from 
Mrs. Joseph Walker, Mrs. John A. Carpenter, Mrs. Charles H. 
Keep, Mrs. Lizette J. Hammond, Mrs. James Steel, Mr. Samuel 
Sloan; the Misses Carol McComas, A. U. Russell, Mary Eliza¬ 
beth Man; the Three Arts Club (through Mrs. M. D. Robinson), 
the Orthopoedic Hospital (through Mrs. Charles H. Keep), all of 
New York City; Miss Ruth Schoelkopf, Buffalo, N. Y., and Mr. 
R. P. Stevens, Bay Ridge, L. I. 
ZONING FOR “THE CITY BEAUTIFUL” 
A very constructive and yet simple plan of zoning has been worked out and used to good effect hy the Rocky Mountain Club in 
Butte, Montana—a plan that might well be followed by other garden clubs and cities striving for civic improvement. By divid¬ 
ing Butte and its immediate environs into districts and putting each district in charge of a committee responsible for its better¬ 
ment this once bleakest of mining towns now lays claim to the largest Pansies in the world and with just pride is called by its 
citizens “Beautiful Butte.” 
Trees and flowers have been planted everywhere and the children have been particularly provided for by the establishment 
of gardens, playgrounds, amusement parks, tennis courts, and other outdoor activities that go to the building up of a robust 
future citizenry. 
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