Victory Gardens, Again

by Meg McGowan

Conscious Choice, May 1998

"Grow your living. It may not be available for you to buy," declared a wartime booklet from International Harvester entitled Have a Victory Garden. More than 50 years later, Chris Eller, director of the Master Gardener Program at the University of Illinois Cooperative Extension Service (CES) voices similar concerns. She, too, is worried about Americans' ability to feed themselves, specifically Chicago residents who are losing and will continue to lose food stamps as a result of recent welfare reform measures. Eller, at the North Chicago office of the U. of I. CES, is heading up a team effort fronted by the Chicago Master Gardeners to educate city residents about growing their own food as a viable alternative. In conjunction with a number of other Chicago-area organizations that make up GreenNet, she is coordinating a program of sustainable/organic agriculture techniques that will benefit the neophyte urban gardener. Some of the techniques such as crop rotation, fall soil preparation, planting cover crops, mulching, trellising, and succession planting harken back to the war gardens of the '40s.

"This year we are planting trial gardens at the homes of several volunteers," says Eller. "We are developing fact sheets on sustainable agriculture and are currently planning workshops, and demonstration gardens at various sites throughout the city." Another possibility is a mentor program, where Master Gardeners would be available to actually provide on-site information. In May, one of the educational tracks at the Green & Growing fair will be Environmental/Habitat Gardening, featuring a two- part seminar entitled "In Partnership with Mother Nature: Ideas for Building Your Sustainable Garden." Integrated pest management, worm composting, garden rain barrels, and plants that feed the soil will be discussed. Blooming Branches Garden Program, presented in conjunction with the Chicago Botanic Garden and the Chicago Public Libraries, offers urban gardening information to both adults and children on an on-going basis. Topics include gardening in limited space, vegetable gardening, and seed starting and transplanting. By next year Eller hopes to incorporate information currently being assembled into the Blooming Branches program.

Not all of this is new, of course. "Many of these techniques have been taught for years," Eller points out. "Part of what is new is that we're trying to gather together these scattered seeds of knowledge, and to integrate what we now know and teach with what we are learning about organic and sustainable gardening techniques."

Seeing the current trend of utilizing city space for food production in a historical context invites comparisons between the war we were engaged in then and the wars we are fighting today -- against poverty, alienation, and the ultimate destruction of our source of life itself, the land. The concept of a Victory garden is grander than that, however. The term speaks of reunion and rejoicing. It speaks of personal triumph that is possible through cooperation of people and the earth. We need not undertake violent efforts in order to experience victory. All we have to do can be summed up by Voltaire, who wrote at the end of Candide, "We must cultivate our garden."