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ELCA World Hunger

A Short Tour of Community Gardens

Our garden at home has finally started yielding its bounty, which means we have more tomatoes than we know what to do with and are engaged in constant battle with rabbits to preserve our harvest. Now is the season when we get to enjoy the fruits of our time spent planting and preparing the soil, with fresh bites from the garden in every meal. It’s a reminder of the growing season and of nature’s wonders.

The fresh veggies making their way from my yard to my plate has had me thinking more about community gardens recently, especially with the rising costs of food making harvests more important for many of us. Interestingly, though, it was not my own garden or food prices that made me look into the history of gardens in the United States. It was, of all things, a comic book.

Most people who know me know that I am obsessed with comics, especially propaganda comics from World War II and early 1950s horror comics that drew the ire of parents and the federal government alike. I recently picked up a copy of this little gem from 1943:

World's Finest Comics #11 cover, with superheroes working in garden

World’s Finest Comics is pretty unremarkable, except for its run of war-themed covers in the early 1940s. Issue #11 here features Superman, Batman and Robin working away in a “victory garden.” (Oh, how nice it would be to have the super-speed of Superman or the ingenuity of Batman to take care of weeding and tilling, right?) Victory gardens, as they were called, were home gardens that the US government encouraged people to start during the war, ostensibly to increase food production at home when so much produce had to be sent to troops overseas, though their significance went far deeper, as we will learn below.

Many people trace community gardens today back to these victory gardens. But the community gardening movement actually started much further back, and the government was not as “super”-supportive of victory gardens as Superman and Batman were – at least early on.

The 1890s – Community Gardens Begin

According to Smithsonian Gardens, part of the Smithsonian Institution, community gardens trace their roots back to Detroit, Michigan, in the 1890s. The economic depression of 1893 hit the city hard, particularly affecting its largely immigrant population. Worried about food shortages and high unemployment, Detroit’s progressive Mayor Hazen Pingree started a public works program for jobs and then encouraged the city to use vacant lots to grow vegetables for the coming winter. “Pingree’s Potato Patches,” as they were called were called, were effective and popular.

Mayor Pingree had another motive besides providing food. The depression had increased economic inequality in the city, and the response of Detroit’s wealthy citizens was to provide charity to address the deep challenges faced by the workers most impacted. Rather than addressing the problems, charity drives fostered a system of patronage, leaving low-income Detroiters dependent on small amounts of help from rich benefactors. Pingree’s gardens were steps toward a more equitable solution, providing spaces for Detroiters facing hunger and poverty to exercise agency. It was a movement for both food security and economic justice. As the Detroit Free Press wrote in 1935, “Pingree’s potato patches broke the back of hunger. They were nationally acclaimed and copied. They revealed a city of boundless energy and industry unwilling to live on doles (the meager charity of the wealthy).”

family tends garden in Detroit 1890s

A family tends a Pingree Potato Patch in Detroit. Image courtesy of the Walter P. Reuther Library, Archives of Labor and Urban Affairs, Wayne State University

 

Turn of the Century and World War I

Pingree’s model was copied in many major cities. As the depression eased, schools turned to gardens both to supplement nutrition and to help an increasingly urban population of children connect back to nature and learn responsibility and the value of work. Perhaps the most famous advocate for the school garden movement was Fannie Griscom Parsons, a tireless leader whose work led to the creation of gardens and farms for children throughout New York City in the first two decades of the 20th Century. Parsons famously wrote,

I did not start a garden simply to grow a few vegetables and flowers. The garden was used as a means to teach [children] in their work some necessary civic virtues; private care of public property, economy, honesty, application, concentration, self-government, civic pride, justice, the dignity of labor, and the love of nature by opening to their minds the little we know of her mysteries, more wonderful than any fairy tale.

With World War I, the gardening movement gained a lot of ground and new support, this time from the US War Gardening Commission. With this fervor, the Commission reported that by 1917, there were more than 3.5 million war gardens across the country, helping supply needed fruits and vegetables during the lean years of the war.

As should be clear by now, though, the gardens were about more than just food. The war gardens of World War I became a symbol of community agency and renewal, especially for African American residents, whose urban neighborhoods were neglected by governments after the war. Drawing on their horticultural skills and passion for beautifying their communities, African American gardeners in Detroit, Philadelphia and other cities scaled up their post-war efforts, even holding contests for residents with the best gardens. These gardens became an important lifeline during the Great Depression of the 1930s.

World War II – Victory Gardens

The World War I gardens planted the seed (ahem) for the victory gardens of World War II. By this point in agricultural history in the US, the government was more reluctant to support gardens. As the Smithsonian notes, most officials thought that large-scale agriculture was more effective. What ultimately convinced the government to promote victory gardens, though, wasn’t a compelling argument about production. Rather, it was the awareness after decades of use that gardens play a powerful role in bringing communities together, improving relationships between neighbors and strengthening morale.

The gardens ended up proving effective in both areas, though. They strengthened communities and they provided an abundance of food – as much as 40 percent of vegetables grown in the US by 1944.

Hidden Depths

The brightly-colored produce, however, hid some gnarled roots, and Superman, Batman and Robin’s smiling faces on the cover of World’s Finest Comics #11 belied deep injustices when it came to gardens and farms in the United States in the 1940s.

As World War II began, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, which authorized the removal and internment of Japanese Americans. While in public press, the order was motivated by fear of spies (a belief that had no basis in reality), the internment campaign had more sinister roots. Japanese Americans, especially in California, had drawn on their deep agricultural knowledge to build successful farming businesses upon their arrival in the US. It was these farms, and the valuable land that Japanese Americans owned, that drove some to call for internment.

Indeed, one of the first documented lobbying efforts to remove Japanese Americans from the West Coast came from none other than the Salinas Valley Vegetable Grower-Shipper Association, which sent a lobbyist to Washington, DC, to argue for forced removal of Japanese American farmers.

By 1942, with Japanese Americans interned and their land under government supervision, white farmers began seizing control of their farms, and the managing secretary of the Western Growers Protective Association reported “considerable profits were realized” by member growers “because of the Japanese removal.”

While incarcerated at the internment camps, many Japanese Americans continued using their skills, however, and developed camp gardens. Despite the desolate landscape of many of the camps, internees used their wisdom, creativity and tenacity to start thousands of thriving gardens. These gardens helped to supplement their diet, but perhaps more importantly, the gardens served as a symbol of resistance against internment, an attempt to hold on to community and traditions and to refuse the dehumanization of internment.

Gardens that had once been indicators of successful business and wealth for immigrant families now, through acts of protest against the injustice of internment, were revealed as symbols of courage, strength and resilience.

Sowing and Reaping

Still today, community gardens carry these multiple layers of meaning. On the one hand, they provide fresh, healthy food. But on a much deeper level, as researchers Rina Ghose and Margaret Pettygrove report, community gardens are spaces where community is formed and citizenship is fostered. They are a protest against powers that control food, land and jobs. And they can be spaces that bear witness to new kinds of communities, new kinds of relationships and new understandings of the economy.

Martin Luther once wrote that farming is an act that imitates God’s creation of the world. By digging into the soil, planting and nurturing crops, we are imitating God’s hands-on approach to making the world. But the long history of gardens in the United States – from immigrants tending “Pingree’s Potato Patches” to investments in gardens for under-served urban children to beautification of segregated neighborhoods and the witness of camp gardens – points to an expanded understanding of how this work imitates God’s creative endeavors.

Yes, we are gifted with the opportunity to witness the Creator God in action as crops take root, but on a deeper level, the community that is nurtured and grown at the garden testifies to the ongoing work of God as the redeemer of the world, reconciling us to one another and building a just world where all are fed.

We aren’t superheroes, but we don’t need to be. The world does not need superheroes as much as it needs neighbors willing to work together, to participate in the restoration of just relationships and communities, asserting together that our neighborhoods are worth investing in and that each and every one of us can play a part. As we’ve learned time and again, gardens can be sacred spaces where neighbors build relationships with one another, assert their pride and dignity, and create a bountiful harvest for the community to enjoy. The hard work of tilling, planting, weeding and watering yields far more than vegetables. It can nourish the growth of communities in profound, life-giving ways.

As we harvest from gardens this season and get ready for planting next spring, this history begs the questions: what are we really sowing? And what new wonders might neighbors working together for the transformation of the landscape and the community reap?

 

If you are interested in starting your own community garden, or finding new ways to expand the garden your community has, check out ELCA World Hunger’s Community Gardens How-To Guide, available in English and Spanish! You can order hard copies from the ELCA World Hunger resources page too!

 

Ryan P. Cumming, Ph.D., is the program director of hunger education for ELCA World Hunger.

Celebrating Big Dream Grants in 2021!

 

We are excited to introduce the four recipients of ELCA World Hunger Big Dream Grants for 2021!

ELCA World Hunger’s Big Dream grants, one-time gifts of $10,000 to $75,000, support ministries in the United States and Caribbean as they pursue innovative and sustainable approaches to ending hunger. Together, we celebrate the ways God is working through these ministries and their “big dreams” for their communities.

Around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic and the associated economic repercussions have brought into focus the weaknesses in the systems and structures intended to ensure that basic human needs are met. In the United States, unemployment, under-employment and healthcare costs are high, and hunger is on the rise. In 2021, ELCA World Hunger’s Big Dream grants will support ministries that are boldly working to uproot, transform or re-envision the structures and norms that perpetuate disparities in access to resources and result in 77% of low-income Americans living without the savings to cover costs when an emergency arises.

Introducing the ELCA World Hunger Big Dream Grants for 2021:

Posada

Pueblo County, Colorado

group of people from PosadaFor 33 years, Posada has been providing shelter, housing and supportive services to people experiencing homelessness or at risk of becoming homeless in Pueblo County, Colorado.  The focus of Posada’s service delivery is the provision of housing and supportive services, which includes referrals for food assistance, food banks and more, with a special focus on food items for youth. The mission of the agency is “to provide housing and supportive services that empower homeless individuals and families in Pueblo County to become self-supporting members of the community.”

The Big Dreams Grant from ELCA World Hunger will help Posada implement and strengthen their Senior Housing facility through the creation of a safety net to support unhoused older adults. Posada addresses the needs of homeless individuals, families, youth, veterans and, now, older adults to break down barriers, reduce inequality and build strong relationships that move us toward a just world where basic needs of all are met.

MOSES

Detroit, Michigan

MOSES is a faith-based, grassroots-led community organizing nonprofit serving residents of Detroit, Michigan, and its surrounding region. An interfaith, multi-racial and regionally-focused organization, MOSES especially emphasizes the leadership of laypeople and clergy from member congregations based in Black communities in Detroit and other southeast Michigan communities. MOSES identifies as a Black-led organization, and their overarching ministry is to develop the civic skills of marginalized residents so that they may act upon their values in the public arena. By focusing on grassroots leadership, MOSES remains rooted in their commitment to addressing needs that are directly expressed and identified by members of marginalized communities. To this goal, MOSES’ priority issues are based upon direct input from community leaders.

The Big Dreams Grant will help MOSES achieve its long-term objective of reforming the ways in which water is sourced, delivered and billed in southeast Michigan, in order to end water shut-offs in low-income neighborhoods. This work is critical in ensuring access to clean water in a city that has experienced crises in access to water over the last decade or more.

MOSES is also working to counter the trend of divestment from Michigan’s public health system by building public demand for increased state investment in public health infrastructure. MOSES is doing this by working to make affordable access to clean water (water equity) and renewed investments in public health central areas of focus in the 2021 Detroit mayoral campaign. At the same time, MOSES is working to build capacity to drive increased investment in public health infrastructure. They are also working with a coalition to establish a graduated income tax structure in Michigan that will protect people living in poverty and create the opportunity for much-needed investment.

Church on the Street

Sioux Falls, South Dakota

Church on the Street is a Synodically Authorized Worshipping Community (SAWC) of the ELCA and a vital ministry in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, with a primary focus of being the church with people living with poverty and homelessness. Church on the Street (COTS) works towards equality, peace, justice and advocacy while offering a place at the table for everyone to be fed physically and spiritually.

Responding to the pandemic, the “small” ministry of COTS has served in big ways. COTS has deep, genuine, ongoing relationships that have enabled them to meet the needs of the most vulnerable people in the community, especially when larger organizations have not been able to provide services to them. The Big Dream grant will enable COTS to double their work in the city, meeting the immediate needs of neighbors, advocating for justice and creating a system of change alongside community responders to best serve those in need.

ForKids

Norfolk, Virginia

ForKids is committed to breaking the cycle of homelessness and poverty for families and children in Norfolk, Virginia. Their integrated services are vital to the safety and well-being of families in their community.

When schools closed for the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, ForKids partnered with Mercy Chefs, local restaurants and individual donors to deliver over 8,000 meals to ForKids families in the region. Their Housing Crisis Hotline geared up to meet the unprecedented call volume which peaked at 935 calls in a single day. The Hotline now handles over 3,000 calls weekly, and ForKids is partnering with multiple cities to administer over $5 million in rental assistance to households experiencing a COVID-related financial setback, in addition to expanding emergency shelter placement. The team has been working diligently to keep families connected to social supports, academic support for their children and other vital resources.

The Big Dreams Grant from ELCA World Hunger will support a digital storytelling campaign to help public officials and community leaders make informed decisions about the issues contributing to hunger and poverty in their region. It will also support the construction of the new Center for Children and Families slated to open in March 2021. The Center includes the Regional Services Headquarters, a 135-bed family shelter, an expanded 24-seat Housing Crisis Hotline which will double call response capability and an education center with the capacity to tutor up to 120 children in creative learning spaces. With a full-service kitchen, ForKids estimates they will be able to provide over 31,000 meals each year. The Center will connect more than 85,000 individuals annually to services when complete. The Center will also be the home of a long-awaited dream: The ForKids Research & Advocacy Center.

Even amid challenging times, we know that God is at work in new and surprising ways. Through these transformative, holistic and integrated ministries – and the generosity that makes Big Dream Grants possible – we can see the impact of this work, and be part of it, in communities near and far. Thank you for your support of ELCA World Hunger as we work together to respond to hunger and poverty in the United States and 59 other countries around the world. To learn more about ELCA World Hunger’s approach, visit ELCA.org/hunger.

 

Big Dream Grants are part of ELCA World Hunger’s support of local and regional ministries. Through Domestic Hunger Grants, Big Dream Grants, Daily Bread Matching Grants, and Hunger Education and Networking Grants, we accompany partners throughout the United States and the Caribbean. Each year, several ministries that exemplify the values of transformative, holistic and integrated work are invited to apply for Big Dream Grants.