Growing History: Victory Gardens
Each November, we celebrate Veterans Day — a chance to recognize and celebrate the men and women who have served in our armed forces. This holiday is an opportunity to honor their bravery and reflect on our history as a nation. While we think of the times our soldiers have fought for the United States on battlefields throughout the world, we also remember the efforts and support offered by those who remained at home. Among the contributions made by those on the home front are Victory Gardens, which are the focus of this article.
The Purpose and Benefits of Victory Gardens
Victory Gardens gained a lot of popularity during World War II, where people across the United States planted fruit, herb and vegetable gardens in backyards, small acreages, communities and public parks to help counter food shortages brought on by the war effort. Growing individual, as well as community, Victory Gardens gave many a sense of pride in their efforts — by helping to ease the stress on the country and provide for their families.
The Stark Bro’s Contribution to the Victory Garden Movement
Paul Stark, brother of former Missouri Governor Lloyd Stark, was greatly involved with Victory Gardens during World War II. The Secretary of Agriculture appointed him to serve as Vice Chairman of the National Garden Advisory Committee. Paul Stark also served as President of the National Victory Garden Institute, which is the organization that originally made the government aware of the need for home production of vegetables and fruits, and mobilized the nation’s top industrialists to participate in the Victory Garden program.
In 1945, President Harry S. Truman named Paul Stark as Director of Home Food Supply of the War Food Administration. His objective was to promote the home production of food and its conservation in the home (canning, drying, etc.).
On his May 21, 1945 appointment sheet Truman wrote, “[Paul Stark] Talked about Victory Gardens… Paul is a fine gentleman. He is very much interested in Victory Gardens program and is anxious to see a Victory Garden started on White House lawn which I fear very much the members of White House staff will not agree to.” (from Off the Record: The Private Papers of Harry S. Truman)
Victory Gardens Today
You might be thinking that the Victory Garden movement sounds a lot like the Grow Your Own movement that is now taking place across the country and throughout the world. What are some other ways you’ve noticed the spirit of Victory Gardens being reflected in your community?
15 comments on “Growing History: Victory Gardens”
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The Garden Watchdog
Dear ones;
I have not seen in your current info anything about Duarf Fruit trees, fruit trees that produce within one season,,, like your “Catalogs” from your pass?
I wonder, do you still offer these/them? if so, I am interested in pricing & availability. I also remember; different varieties on one tree (ie; apples) also in containers,,, I live in the Tyler, TX area, and would like info about these products from U, if U still offer them.
Thank you, Bill
Hi, Bill! I will have to go back and look at our old Stark Bro’s catalogs to see which trees you might be remembering and I can get back to you — nothing is coming to mind at the moment.
Update: You could be remembering the testimonials in our old catalogs with photos of trees that bore fruit in the first year after being planted. Nowadays, we recommend pinching these blossoms to allow the trees to get better established themselves before trying to put their energy into supporting fruit. It’s better for the trees in the long run.
Everything we currently have available can be found on our website here: http://www.starkbros.com — if you’d like to be put on our mailing list for a current catalog you can sign up here: http://www.starkbros.com/our-company/request-a-catalog
I am one of a volunteer team of people who run the largest community garden in the Charlotte (Mecklenburg Co) NC area. We have 76 20×20 plot where folk gp food for thier home and area food programs. Our area allows year round growing too. I am very proud of my Garden, with my having 2 20×20′s. We share a lot of stuff beteen our gardeners. Stark Bros has been recommended for strawbeeries and other stuff in our Garden. I ahve also been mentioning the training videos – a lot of us grow fruit trees at home. (so no veggies as the sun doesn’t make it to the ground!)
Thanks!
Brian, your community garden sounds amazing! We love when people are encouraged to get together in such a way to benefit the community. Does your Mecklenburg Co. community garden have a Facebook Page or a Blog? We’d be happy to follow and see the growing success.
Here in our local community there is a food shelf that encourages the community to “plant a row for CAER.” It is wonderful to be able to share extra produce with those who are in economic distress, regardless of the reason. Often those who are getting by with the help of a food shelf do not have much opportunity to get fresh produce. And, most gardeners that I know always have something extra – more than they can use. I believe this touches the recipient’s body, soul & spirit!
You’re so right, Judy! Many places that understand the need to get fresh produce to the local community truly benefit the people they are trying to help. I especially love this “plant a row” idea as a gardener who has grown more produce (tomatoes and squash) than I can use some years.
How about the First Lady’s efforts in this regard? It looks like the White House finally got its Victory Garden. I am currently living in Florida but plan to get back to my home state of Pennsylvania by the first of February, 2013. Just in time to get busy with Philadelphia’s community gardening program. Can’t wait!
I am glad you mentioned this, Marguerite! I wanted to include a photo of the White House Kitchen Garden but I wasn’t sure if about the rights to the ones I’ve found. Especially connecting with President Truman’s words about Paul Stark being “…anxious to see a Victory Garden started on White House lawn which I fear very much the members of White House staff will not agree to.” — Mr. Stark and President Truman would be delighted to see how far things have progressed on that front!
In addition to planting heritage tomatoes, red okra, etc., we have put in a peach/apple/pear orchard, blackberries, raspberries (red), figs, and nut trees (almond, walnut, pecan for the long-term). Next year, we plan to add 2 acres of blueberries. The orchard will have deer-retardant fencing, where a flock of chickens will free range. A few Guineas will keep down the ticks and ants. Our aim is to become self-sufficient, our form of Victory Garden. We will have some smut-nosed rabbits, a cross between the New Zealand and Californian. Between the chickens (and their eggs) and the rabbits, our protein needs will be met.
This is a return to my grandparents’ way of living, where I grew up. The only thing missing is the hog lot.
This year, we canned, froze or dried all of the produce which we did not consume. We are looking locally for a source of wheat, as we have our own grinding mill. Home-baked bread is the best!
I neglected to mention that we have built raised troughs for the Ozark sreawberries. For some reason, 1/2 our plants died withing weeks of planting. Stark Bros was quick to zip replacements to us, and we have lots of daughters from the original plants! We are trying out the Fuyu persimmons and the Delicious cots. Next year, we hope to add a grape arbor and that our mulberry will coax the birds away from the other fruits.
Willard, I have to admit I am a little envious of everything you’re growing there! I have a modest garden and I’ve added berry plants (raspberry, blackberry, loganberry) that I am excited to harvest from next year, but I am pretty sure I can’t keep a chicken or two on my lot in town — they are a great pest-deterrent and the eggs are a bonus! I wish you all the best getting back to that self-sustainable way of life. It’s so worth it!
Your article on Remembering Victory Gardens brings back memories from my Mom who grew up in the depression saying how they shared food with others even though they had little to eat themselves. How kinfolk helped kinfolk. I had the best vegetable garden ever this fall until the wild hogs rooted up the whole thing in one night. They came back three days later to re-root it up and then tear up the yard rooting up pecans that the squirrels had buried. I had really planned to pressure can sweet corn, green beans, black-eyed peas, beets, turnips, and carrots, along with making pickles. My young apple and peach tree did make quite a bit of fruit this year, which I was able to hot water bath to preserve them. Two of the hogs are now in the freezer.
I guess a bright side is that the hogs, which were fed well by your garden, fed you in the end. Sometimes the worst pests aren’t insects. I hope you are able to keep these hogs away from next year’s garden so that your canning and preserving plans can come to fruition!
Hi there,
Were there ever any sort of “standardized” victory gardens, where for example the dimensions of a plot were given and a layout for how the garden was to be seeded? Or recommendations of varieties or types of plants?
Lastly, might it be possible to offer an “heirloom victory garden assortment”, perhaps optimized for a small plot of a certain dimension that would include the same varieties in common use during the war?
Thank you! I have seen references to wartime pamphlets but darned if I can find any of them on the net though logic say they should be there.
Great questions, Mark! Since Victory Gardens were to encourage people to grow what they could in whatever amount of space they had (individually or as a community), there were probably not widely distributed standardized dimensions for one. I haven’t found any information to give the impression there was one standard Victory Garden size, but I believe certain locations found it easy to give a standard dimension for a certain family size. This differed from location to location, though, especially keeping crops in mind and crops that can grow in Michigan differ from crops that grow in Alabama, for example.
I found a very interesting video on Victory Gardens here: http://archive.org/details/victory_garden — this seems like something that was shown to encourage and educate people on the importance of growing a Victory Garden and how it is helpful. They do mention the space needed, the crops that can be grown there, and tips on growing year-round, for the family depicted in the video, but simply as an example.
I also found a Victory Garden Handbook from 1944 here: http://www.earthlypursuits.com/VictoryGardHandbook/VGHv.htm — again these were more like regional guides than standardized dimensions across the board. This is an excerpt from this handbook (geared toward Pennsylvania gardeners):
“To assist Pennsylvania’s expected 1,540,000 Victory Gardeners, many of whom will have only small plots of ground available, the Advisory Victory Garden Committee of the State Council of Defense has prepared diagrams (shown on pages 51 to 55) for two miniature-size city gardens (15 x 11 and 15 x 20) and three medium-size sub-urban or community-plot gardens (20 x 25, 30 x 30, and 35 x 35). The diagrams are drawn in exact scale, showing position of rows, number of inches between rows (noted in left margin) , the recommended vegetables to plant, and planting dates for Pennsylvania.”