March, i 91 7 
27 
Endive well deserves attention as a salad plant, 'but it should never Nauniburger is one of the finest butterhead lettuces. It perfects 
be served alone. In combination with butterhead lettuce and French splendid 10" heads in fifty-five days from the time seeds are sown, 
dressing it is delicious but it is not a good midsummer sort 
FILLING THE SALAD BOWL 
As It Should Be Filled Is Simple Enough When You 
Know What Plants to Grow and How to Grow Them 
O URS being a family of salad lovers, I 
found myself more or less in “deep 
water” the year around. The more exact¬ 
ing one’s requirements become, the more 
one realizes the limitations of markets. So 
I finally decided to take the bull by the 
horns, to study the subject from the ground 
up, with the result that the salad problem 
has become a salad blessing in which tasty, 
flavory lettuce plays a most important part. 
Since lettuce forms the most popular 
basis of all salads, I began to study it first. 
Few things I have attempted proved more 
intricate than the Correct selection of sorts 
which would best serve my purpose. It 
developed that there are four distinct types, 
and of these I finally selected the kinds 
which, to judge from the descriptions, 
seemed to measure up to the requirements 
in nearly ideal fashion. 
Of course, there were some disappoint¬ 
ments. When I tried to grow in summer 
sorts recommended for spring use only, 
they quickly turned bitter and grew seed 
stalks instead of heads. Again, when I 
proceeded to prepare salads from heads 
grown during August, using 
the same dressing as I did 
for the more delicately fla¬ 
vored spring crops, the re- 
suits were disappointing. 
The sum and substance of 
my experience inspired this 
discourse on salads, offered 
here for the benefit of those 
home gardeners who like 
them as well as we do. 
Lettuces Worth Growing 
There are four distinct 
classes of lettuce, the indi¬ 
vidual members of which 
differ very little in general 
characteristics but very 
much in habit. Some grow 
very quickly, making big 
bunches of leaves, and then 
ELEANOR R. GILLAM 
Among the crispheads dependable for summer 
use Iceberg is a worthy leader. It matures in 
sixty-five days from sowing 
go to seed. Others make firm heads in the 
spring, but “shoot” seed stalks as soon as 
hot weather approaches. Still others are 
very slow growers, but they also form the 
most solid heads and go to seed only after 
trying hard to rot inside before bursting. 
The earliest of all lettuces to yield crisp, 
tender salads in the spring I found to be 
the loose-leaf sorts. After trying quite a 
number, I decided that Black-seeded Simp¬ 
son served my purpose in as nearly ideal 
fashion as any. It was ready for use, with 
fine, big plants about 10" in diameter, in 
forty-five days after seeds were sown. It 
remained in perfect condition for two weeks 
■—at least four days longer than any of the 
other extra early spring sorts. As a result, 
it stayed in fine condition for flavory salads 
just about a week longer, when my prize¬ 
winner among the butterhead lettuces— 
Naumburger—yielded its first fine heads. 
For Later Use 
Naumburger, or Tenderheart, as it is 
called by some, perfected its attractive light 
green 10" heads in exactly fifty-five days 
from the time the seeds were 
sown. I have tested and 
tasted many lettuces during 
the last fifteen years, but I 
have never found one to 
surpass in flavor this splen¬ 
did butterhead sort, especial-- 
ly when prepared for salad 
with the French dressing to 
which I shall refer later. 
When later sowings of 
Naumburger produced seed 
stalks or “bolted,” as the ex¬ 
perienced gardener calls it, 
the crisphead lettuces saved 
the day. The most attrac¬ 
tive and dependable of these 
proved invariably to be Ice¬ 
berg. The first heads are 
generally ready in sixty-five 
{Continued on page 94) 
Prizehead at the left and Black-seeded Simpson beside it. The latter 
is one of the best extra early, loose-leafed sorts, and should be in 
every salad garden 
