Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 92, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 February 1919 — Ten Million Organized Women Indorse United States School Garden Army [ARTICLE]

Ten Million Organized Women Indorse United States School Garden Army

By MRS. JOHN D. SHERMAN.

General Federation of Women’i Club*

Ten million women in the United States want school-supervised gardens for children. These ten million women are the members of the General Federation of Women’s clubs, with state, district and local organizations, and of the National Council of Women, which includes 29 national organizations. The interests of these organizations center in the child. . We believe that the United States School Garden Army now being conducted by" the federal bureau of education should be continued. The children need the help and inspiration that only the federal government can give. ■ ... jWe know' that the school-superviseS gardens of 1918 were a distinct success from a practical and food-producing viewpoint and that they paid. One and a half million boys and girls had school or home gardens. Food produced amounted to at least $10,000,000. We believe that gardening for children is a school subject, that it must be handled by the schools and that it must be made a regular part of the school course. We believe that practical knowledge of gardening ranks in importance with reading, writing and arithmetic in the development of the child. We believe that in learning to produce-food from the soil the child acquires a mental and moral growth of far greater value than any knowledge which is limited to textbooks. It helps fit him for intelligent and creative citizenship. . .. We believe that supervised gardening, w'hich includes instruction in the use of food, storage and marketing, will train a child in thrift and responsibility. We know that while the child is at work producing food from the soil he will learn the vital life lesson that he must not be a parasite and that honest productive labor of the hands is as honorable as that of the head. We know that gardens supervised through the summer months have kept thousands of children .off the streets and out of the juvenile courts. Three million children in the United States go to school hungry. School gardens will help to feed these children. We appeal to congress on behalf of the ten million organized women of the United States and on behalf of the school children of the country to support the United States School Garden Army. The appropriation will be an investment in citizenship.