Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 95, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 April 1915 — HOME TOWN HELPS [ARTICLE]

HOME TOWN HELPS

SOUNDS A DISCORDANT NOTE Plan for Civic Beautification is Opposed by Leading Pittsburgh Journal. At Atlantic City the United States department of agriculture proposes to demonstrate for the country what can be accomplished In civic beautification by transforming bare lots, street terraces, portions of playgrounds and vacant. property Into flower gardens. Alexander Weintrob, who last year visited Europe to see what is being done there to spread the beautification movement among the people has been designated in charge of the Atlantic City plan. Substitution of flowers for vegetables in lot development will be urged generally, it Is said, if it succeeds there. The project, says the Pittsburgh Dispatch, recalls the free seed largess. If the department of agriculture is going to try to make those seeds grow, something that few of the recipients of congressional bounty have been able to do, it may be al) right, but it seems as much a waste of governmental effort as the seed distribution is of public money. Civic beautification, further observes the Dispatch, mlgnt well be left to the various communities themselves. If Atlantic City householders or lot owners prefer vegetables to flowers, in the hope of cutting down the cost of living or making money supplying the tables of visitors, why should Uncle Sam intervene? Just at this time, with so many important crop problems to be considered, the department might be more profitably employed on practical work.