Back to the 1970s: Recession gardens

It rains so much in Providence nowadays that I spend more time with the newspapers and online and less time in the garden. First the newspaper…

Yesterday, the Providence Journal ran a story on recession gardens. Southside Community Land Trust is expanding the Prairie Street Community Garden to accommodate more plots, and URI Master Gardener Coordinator Roseanne Sherry is hearing from more and more new gardeners this year. And the trend is national, with seed companies reporting record sales in 2009.

The last upsurge in food gardening took place during the economic crises of the 1970s.  In Rhode Island, Bristol legislator Gaetano Parella put forth four resolutions to make underused local, state, and federal land available for individual gardens in 1974. Reflecting on the victory gardens of WWII, Parella said there was “no reason why our citizens cannot do the same thing now to fight rising food costs.” A ProJo article from the same year described “Rhode Island’s growing army of backyard farmers.”

Now that you have read this newspaper article (online, perhaps), try googling “recession garden,” “recession gardens,” or “recession gardening.” Expect this term to start competing with victory garden/s/ing.

Speaking of googling, if you enter “Victory Garden,” the first entry to pop up is PBS’s television show. “The Victory Garden” began broadcasting in the mid-1970s; it was America’s first gardening program on tv. The goal was to encourage Americans to fight the recession by growing their own food. By using the name “Victory Garden,” the creators evoked nostalgia for the can-do spirit of wartime gardens. And I suppose that in 1975, nobody wanted to watch a show called “The Recession Garden.”

In 2009, we just might.

Green Swap: take it and leave it

Lookit: standing outside the RISD store on the River-Side.

It’s an ongoing garden swap, kind of along the lines of those book/magazine racks outside T stops in Boston (Do these still exist?) Take some plants/seeds/garden equipment, and leave some plants/seeds/garden equipment in return.

I left some volunteer dill and violets and took some garden gloves. Wonder what will be there next?

Brown dog is provided for scale. See the bronze plaque hovering above the cabinet? That marks how high the flood waters reached following the 1938 hurricane.

Time to plant! Southside Community Land Trust’s plant sale and the Youth Pride plant sale are this weekend. Get your baby vegetables, raised with tender loving care, and assist some great causes, too.

Providence Farm City

Apologies to KISS…

Yesterday, I went to a meeting for Providence’s Urban Agriculture Task Force. Launched 4-5 years ago, it’s a confederation of state, local, non-profit, and individual representatives. Some of the projects initiated and/or completed by members include:

• installing new community gardens around the city, including sites at Sessions St. Park, Early St, Davis Park, Pearl St., Riverside Park, and more
• introducing urban agriculture in community planning meetings, the Mayor’s Green plan, and the Providence Comprehensive Plan
• launching a citywide Community Gardens Network
• developing strategies to integrate food gardens with affordable housing
• holding 50-mile meals at Mount Hope Farm, Local 121, and Providence College
• creating the RI Farm To School Project to connect local farms with school lunch programs
• planning an edible landscape (an orchard!) in Locust Grove Cemetery
• working with the RI Dept of Health and Statewide Planning to ensure that urban agriculture is in local comprehensive plans
• preparing a series of reports on Providence Urban Agriculture

Amazing projects in Providence and beyond. And more to come. If you want to get involved, contact the UATF via Southside Community Land Trust.

In the zone

Thanks to everyone who stopped by Firehouse 13 last night for Green Zones: From the War Garden to Your Garden and the first-ever Urban Ag Spring Start Party.

The talks and discussion went over really well, and the seed-swapping table was hopping.  I got a chance to connect with gardeners, historians, and gardening historians from all over.

A spring party was a great outlet for gardeners with seeds, plants, and stories to share. As RI’s food gardening network continues to grow, imagine another garden event this fall?!?!?!?!

Green Zones Event…and Urban Ag Spring Start?

Check out the updated page for Green Zones: From the War Garden to Your Garden, a presentation on Victory Gardens, the Women’s Land Army of America, and how/why gardeners are growing their own food today. The event takes place on Tues., May 5, starting at 5:30pm at Firehouse 13, 41 Central St. in Providence.

A plan is stirring to hold an Urban Agriculture Spring Start Party afterwards. This will include seed/plant swapping, exchanging ideas, food, music, and kicking off the garden season together.

Community gardeners, backyard gardeners, local foodies, green folks, farmers, teachers, kids. . .can you help out with this emerging event?  Contact me at szurier at wesleyan dot edu or leave a comment, and I’ll be in touch.

Apeiron, Abraham. Abraham, Apeiron.

Fickle Providence! Sometimes one must choose between gardens and history. I’m headed to the latter, but I’d love to hear from you about the former. Both events will take place Thursday, Feb. 26.

For the gardeners and foodies:
From 5:30-8pm, the Apeiron Institute for Sustainable Living is holding an Evolution Forum on Sustainable & Local Food: “We can have a big impact on the size of our ecological footprint with the food we eat, or don’t eat and by choosing where it comes from.” Panelists hail from RI-DEM/Agriculture; Farm Fresh Rhode Island; RI General Assembly; Ledge Ends Produce; and Southside Community Land Trust.

17 Gordon Avenue, Suite 207 Providence. $10 for non-members. 
More info: 401-228-7930 info@apeiron.org

For the history buffs and Abrahamaniacs:
Starting at 7pm, RI Historical Society is holding a special event to open an exhibit on Rhode Island in the Time of Lincoln: “Though Lincoln made only two stops in RI, they were widely attended and remembered. But what did the RI that Lincoln visited look like?” Explore the exhibit, and listen to presentations about the people, places, and attitudes of the times.

110 Benevolent St., Providence
More info: 401-331-8575 x45 dgoulart@rihs.org

gardening on the homefront: take that, Slacker Land!

As America entered World War I, women and children enlisted in garden armies, gardeners went to battle against insect pests, and every effort was made to ensure that “our food is fighting.” But as if all that wasn’t enough, American land also was compelled to go to war.

The National War Garden Commission targeted empty city lots and sent out battalions of pitchfork-waving civilians…to use their pitchforks and garden. America could not afford to have any land slacking off during wartime. Gives a whole new meaning to the idea of fighting to protect American soil.

The “slacker land” was put to work as sites for community gardens. The benefits of community War Gardens included sharing expertise, soil preparation activities, plants, and equipment. And there were the social benefits: friendly rivalry, community building, etc. In The War Garden Victorious (1919), Charles Lathrop Pack promoted community gardens as community assets that increased real estate values, freed up funds that would have been spent on food, and beautified the city. He urged local governments, chambers of commerce, and other civic organizations to retain the gardens as a post-war economic development program.

Contemporary proponents of urban agriculture use many of the same arguments today. See “Urban Agriculture in Providence,” a publication of the Urban Agriculture Policy Task Force initiated by Southside Community Land Trust/Citywide Green. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of vacant lots in Providence. Join a community garden, and “put that slacker land to work!”

Greening Green Zone: veg, herbs, flowers

Green Zone sprouts...

...seedlings...

...30 May 2008

In eight used tires, eight shopping bags, and one pair of shoes, I’ve planted several dozen veg, herbs, and flowers. Some have bit the dust…plucked, thinned, eaten, dehydrated, over-shaded, out-competed, drowned, killed. Such is life in the urban jungle.

Most of the plants started from seeds…gourmet types from Johnny’s Selected Seeds in Maine, finds from the racks at Ocean State Job Lot, or leftovers (aka heirlooms) from last year’s garden. This spring, Rich Pederson from Southside Community Land Trust kindly tended a flat full at the City Farm greenhouse: poppies, red russian kale, green leafy kale, scarlet runner beans, mini-sunflowers, morning glories, ornamental gourds. I started another batch in a sunny basement window at home: lettuce, turnips, basil, bachelor’s button, arugula.

Radish seeds were planted directly into the tires…those puppies pop up quickly and won’t endure transplanting. I transplanted spares from my home garden…johnny jump-ups, dill, oregano, lemon balm, broccoli…and traded with friends for some marigolds and mint.

Some of the plants are doing better in Green Zone than in my raised beds at home. And sometimes a scarlet runner bean or gourd in one tire is outperforming the same plant two tires away. They get the same temperatures, the same soil, the same sun, the same water, the same company. Talk about microclimates–a world of difference, just a tire away!

Green Zone, 30 May 2008

Green Zone, 25 July 2008