Article 7:
Victory Gardens, A Helping Hoe, Page 1
By Deborah Hedstrom-Page

A handful of seeds, garbage from the kitchen, and shovels full of chicken pooh don't seem like much. But during World War II (1941-1945), they provided forty percent of the food eaten in the United States. While grocery companies shipped their canned, boxed and packaged goods to soldiers fighting in the war, almost twenty million Americans planted "Victory Gardens."

The idea of people growing their own food wasn't new. Since the pilgrims got off the Mayflower, Americans have tilled land with edible crops. But when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, many people had moved off of farms and into big cities where they worked in factories. This meant they depended on grocery stores for the family food. But as more and more young men and women marched off to war, the commercial foods that lined store shelves had to be shipped to Europe, North Africa, and the South Pacific. This meant less food for families at home.

Concerned government officials encouraged Americans to grow their own food. Posters and newspaper/magazine ads throughout the country declared, "Plant A Victory Garden: Our Food is Fighting." A few years later they still urged, "Your Victory Garden counts more than ever." In addition, free public service booklets told how to grow fruits and vegetables. Published by companies such as International Harvester, Beech-nut Packing, and Good Housekeeping, they taught folks how to plant, fertilize soil, and protect against crop-eating bugs.

When the families of soldiers realized they could help the war effort by swinging a hoe, wives, moms, grandparents and even boys and girls tilled up back yards and vacant lots. Those who lived in apartments also joined the gardening force. Their towns provided garden plots by plowing up public lands such as school grounds and baseball fields. Even San Francisco’s city hall, Chicago’s Arlington Park, and Oregon’s Portland Zoo provided land for plots.

The gardeners had little fertilizer because the world-wide war needed most chemicals being produced. So folks fed their small plots of land with compost made from food scraps, lawn clippings, wood ash, chimney soot, and manure from the many chicken and rabbit hutches that started popping up in backyards. Some even broke up leftover bones with hammers and emptied their vacuum cleaner dust bags into compost piles.

In addition to planting and fertilizing, the war gardeners watered, weeded, and picked their crops. Their hard work paid off. Soon beans, potatoes, beets, squash, cabbage, and dozens of other home-grown vegetables filled the bowls