“Grow Your Own. Be sure!”
The words, circa 1940, are from a poster heralding the victory garden movement. The message, still resonant today, places emphasis on access to healthy food and food provenance rather than a dearth of food supply. The victory gardens of yore were community and private gardens encouraged by the United States government in order to ease the pressure on the national food supply that was strained by two consecutive World Wars. In 1943, those gardens—the work of three-fifths of the American population—produced some eight million tons of food. The victory garden program was one of the most popular in the war period and provided seeds, fertilizer, and simple tools for gardeners. An estimated 15 million families planted victory gardens in 1942, and in 1943 some 20 million victory gardens produced more than 40 percent of the vegetables grown for that year’s fresh consumption. The majority of victory gardens were abandoned after the war, when the rationing of canned food ended and the newly implemented Interstate Highway System helped to develop the sophisticated national food distribution network still in place today.
Michelle Obama’s decision to plant a kitchen garden makes her the only first lady to grow vegetables since Eleanor Roosevelt grew the first White House victory garden during World War II. The current White House garden broke ground on March 20, and while its primary role is to feed the Obama family and White House staff, according to Mrs. Obama, the garden’s “most important role will be to educate children about healthful, locally grown fruit and vegetables at a time when obesity and diabetes have become a national concern.”
The primary reason for the sudden new popularity of victory gardens is economic uncertainty, but the seeds for a full-fledged backyard garden revival have been germinating for some time. Since 1984, Slow Food International, Slow Food USA, and, on a local level, Pure Catskills, have sought to preserve regional food traditions and histories and reinvigorate community food systems. Food systems are comprised not just of farmers, but also processing facilities and retail outlets like farmers markets. Activist chefs like Alice Waters have brought celebrity power to focus public attention on creating healthy food programs for schools. Waters’s Edible Schoolyard is a successful educational model at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School in Berkeley and at affiliate schools throughout the country. Locavores emphasize consuming local, fresh food and supporting the philosophy of small family farms, community, and environmental health. Government subsidies to a handful of agribusiness concerns spur the market glut of corn and soy, two ingredients in numerous products from bread to beef to soda, which in turn have been linked to diabetes, heart disease, and other health problems. Deadly pathogens such as those recently found in spinach and jalapenos are the direct result of the environmental and moral bankruptcy of industrial farming. Genetically modified seeds threaten the disappearance of heirloom, antique, and heritage plants.
An Opportunity for Growth
Times of change elicit fear, however, and uncertain times also provide opportunities for growth. “One positive development of our current economic crisis is a rekindling of interest in the skills that used to be taken for granted by our ancestors,” says Andy Turner, the executive director of the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Greene County. “We are noticing an unquenchable thirst for programs on backyard gardening, food preservation, local food systems, and beekeeping; or anything that teaches people how to live more artfully and joyfully in their own backyard.”
Claire Parde, the co-op’s community food systems coordinator, is seeing renewed interest in food preservation. “These people are not foodies per se, but people who feel uncertain, people who need to know how to do for themselves,” she says. “There is an interest in offsetting some of food bills but also in a strategy for self-sufficiency. The growing interest in home vegetable gardening and home-based food and fiber gardens reflects the climate of scarcity of economic resources that people perceive. People are trying to reshape their household economies, reduce costs, and maybe feel more resilient.”
Parde and others, including former Brooklynite and current Cairo resident Walter Prapolsky, were recently given official permission to have the community garden in Cairo. Back in 1942 Brooklyn, the young Prapolsky was involved in the Highland Park Community Garden. “There were no such things as school buses, so we’d walk home from school and stop by the park with the individual plots,” he recalls. “We did everything from scratch—dug it up, planted everything, weeded, harvested when everything was ripe, and brought it home.” Does he see any connection between the former Victory gardens and the current victory gardens? “Sure,” he says. “Those were hard economic times—we’re having a hard time now.”
Another corollary between the two eras of victory gardens is extension involvement—creating and facilitating these garden programs on both a community and personal level. Prapolsky is a master gardener, one who has logged so many hours with continuing education classes that he is a living community resource on gardening, and assists in answering gardening-related questions. “If I don’t know the answer on the spot,” he offers, “I’ll do the research and get back to you.”
The City of Kingston broke ground on a victory garden at City Hall on April 22. The Kingston victory garden is a joint project coordinated by the Kingston Land Trust, the Kingston Victory Gardens Project, the mayor’s office, and the city’s public school system. “We want to get gardeners new and old together to help one another to garden,” explains Rebecca Martin, who chairs the Kingston Land Trust’s garden committee. “There is a process and an art to gardening. We’re working with teachers and 50 students from the high school, the Cornell Cooperative Extension, farmers, master and local gardeners, boys and girls clubs, and the Hudson Valley Seed Library, which donated a large portion of the seeds. The plan is to use this garden to promote city gardens, to turn Kingston into a little garden city by starting from the core and moving out.” The Kingston victory garden will be planted with the “Three Sisters”—squash, maize, and climbing beans, which were the main crops for Esopus Basin Native Americans.
A Garden by Another Name
While victory is the moniker du jour for edible garden, food garden, or kitchen garden, in the current economic and philosophical climate it doesn’t really matter what you call your garden, as long as you garden. Ken Greene, co-founder of the Hudson Valley Seed Library, prefers not to use the victory term. “My hope is that today’s home gardens have taken on an even greater meaning,” he explains. “Gardeners have the opportunity to take back control, feed themselves and their communities, be producers instead of consumers, grow cultural and genetic diversity in their backyards, save seeds, and pass on regional food security to their families, friends, neighbors, and communities. I would like to see us coin a new term for home-grown patriotism—backyard activism, liberty gardens, or freedom gardens.” The Hudson Valley Seed Library is a homestead-based farm business devoted to developing a seed-production network in the region. Using hand tools and low-tech processes, dozens of varieties of agronomic plants are cultivated on its Accord farm, with the goal of offering high-quality heirloom seeds to the public. For 2009, the facility is offering 15 varieties of locally grown seeds; by 2014, it aims to offer 100 percent locally grown seeds.
Dig It
The modern disconnect with nature, especially food production, often renders the idea of implanting an edible landscape as something monumentally mystifying. It isn’t, really. Those 50 million American households with a modest yard can begin producing food by replacing their lawns with gardens. The first step is to identify your USDA Plant Hardiness Zone. Make a list of desired vegetables and herbs and make sure they coincide with cultural requirements for your zone. An avocado tree is not a good choice unless you own or have access to a large greenhouse. Locate a consistently sunny location in practical proximity to your house. Most herbs and vegetables require full sun for optimal growth.
Order local seeds from the Hudson Valley Seed Library or national organic sources like Seed Savers Exchange, Seeds of Change, or FedCo. Rip out sod and replace it with organic soil or topsoil. Raised beds are another option. Compost your organic kitchen refuse—although take into account the proximity and abundance of local wildlife and protect or secure your compost location accordingly. If local wildlife is an issue, consider investing in an indoor composting bin.
Collect and recycle rainwater with a rainwater barrel and use as many local materials—leaf litter, grass clippings—as possible for compost or mulch. There are two reasons for this. The first is that you won’t spend any money; the second is that local materials will work in better partnership with local soil and plant materials. Rake leaves into a pile in autumn and let them stand over the winter. The natural biological breakdown will produce a nutrient-rich soil cover. Check with your local town roads department for scheduled tree maintenance and chipping times; often, woodchips will be available for free. On occasion, roads departments will gladly cart truckloads of woodchips to a specified location, as they are only too happy to have a way to dispose of them.
For a small garden, simple hand tools such as an iron rake, spade, shovel, and hoe will do the job, while investing in a rototiller might be smart for a larger garden. If you are so inclined, a wheel hoe or a broad fork will also do the job, although those will require more muscle power.
Home gardens are not limited residences with outdoor acreage or plots of soil. Container gardening will produce a nice supply of herbs and vegetables. Just make sure to use terra-cotta planters, as they let soil breathe, and select dwarf cultivars of vegetables—a grape or cherry tomato over a beefsteak—which will require less room.
Whether you call it a victory garden or something else, your garden will be reflective of the very personal victory of self-sufficiency and an increased awareness of the interconnectivity of life, spirit, and beauty.
Cornell Cooperative Extension: www.cce.cornell.edu
Kingston Land Trust: www.thekingstonlandtrust.org
Hudson Valley Seed Library: www.seedlibrary.org.