Fearless Food: LaManda Joy on Victory Gardens and Rosie Riveters
LaManda Joy, Founder of the Peterson Garden Project
Gardens are radical. Food is a feminist issue. I’ve been researching the story of women in the Chicago Victory Garden movement, and realized pretty quickly LaManda Joy is the go-to authority on this amazing piece of our history. One of the leading urban gardeners today, she shares her philosophy and family history with the nation’s Victory Garden movement in this interview with Gender Assignment.
LaManda, your parents sound like really fascinating people. In one of your lectures you mention your father was drafted at age 18, and your mother became a “Rosie the Riveter”. Where did she work, and what skills did she acquire? Did she use any of them when your father returned? What did she do after the war?
On her 16th birthday, my Mother got on the streetcar in L.A. and went to Webber Showcase (which, before the war was a jewelry case maker - during the war they manufactured bomber doors) and applied for a job as a Rosie the Riveter and got it. She had tried earlier but they said she had to be 16. The Rosies at her factory worked in pairs - you had the riveter and a “blocker” who held a block under the area being riveted. They used to write encouragement notes to the G.I.s and put them inside the bomber doors.
I don’t know if she got it during her time as a Rosie, but my mother is a hard worker. Up into her 80s she put women half her age (including myself) to shame with all she accomplished. After the war she, like many other women, returned to home making and my mother was a full-time mom. She did have jobs as long as they didn’t get in the way of being home when we were home (I have a brother and sister who are 15 and 13 years older than me, respectively. We are all adopted.) When I was in grade school she drove the Senior Citizen bus during the school year and she’d pick me up and it would be me and the old folks tooling around town. That was a lot of fun. In the summers she would work for the local strawberry farmer. You can read more about that here: http://theyarden.com/the-strawberry-queen-of-columbia-county/
My parents both had an incredible work ethic that I hope I have inherited. They had a lot of pride in what they did - everything they did - and were proud of a job well done.
LaManda Joy, author of Start a Community Food Garden: The Essential Handbook (Timber Press, 2015). Photo courtesy of Timber Press
You said your father was an avid gardener. How did he become so knowledgable? How did he teach you these skills? Did your mother garden with him, too?
After the war, my parents moved to Oregon from L.A. to be near my Mother’s grandparents (who had raised her). It was there that my Father learned to garden from my great grandfather. When I came along in the late 60’s he had become an avid gardener and I was out there with him from my earliest memories. Mother also gardened but she worked on the flowers. She also was an incredible cook/baker/preserver so she taught me all those skills.
Did your mother get involved in the Victory Garden movement in Chicago while your father was at war?
They lived in L.A. and she remembers having a small garden at her grandparent’s house.
Were women the primary gardeners during this time? How did women balance their domestic duties with gardening during this movement?
You would think this would be the case but, surprisingly, the “records” indicate that a lot of men who were unable to fight (due to age or medical conditions) were leaders in the movement. That doesn’t mean women didn’t play their part. In the Chicago story, there are strong women with leadership roles in the Victory Garden movement. But in the “rank and file” stories, if you will, there’s more about men doing it than women. Also, organizers (at least in Chicago) were very specific that Victory Gardens were something to be done in “leisure time” - they didn’t want it distracting from the business of war. They also stressed that just a few hours a week could provide food for a family. Which is true to this day.
How did recipes change during this time?
Rationing made everything scarce (thus the need for the Victory Gardens). Sugar was in short supply so people used molasses. Butter was hard to come by so people substituted applesauce. There’s a whole “genre” of “ration recipes” available on the internet. I’ve made and tasted some. They weren’t so great… but, admittedly, it was a limited sampling.
How did their lives change when Victory Gardens were no longer needed for the war?
Contrary to popular belief, the Victory Garden movement continued after the war. The names just changed…at first, as the world was settling down and communism and the cold war were coming into play, they were called “Freedom Gardens” and you’d see propaganda like “Food Fights the Red Menace”. Then, as the world started to slowly recuperate and the troops came home, inflation hit so they were called “Thrift Gardens”… I’ve heard many stories of former neighborhood Victory Gardens lasting for years after the war only to go away when the land was used for other purposes. And, of course, Boston has the famous Fenway Gardens which have continued from the site of an original WW2 garden to this day. There’s also one on the South Side in Chicago called Rainbow Beach that was an original Victory Garden.
The story of Peterson Garden Project is a truly remarkable one, built on the site of an original Victory Garden! How does this project invoke the values of the Victory Garden movement?
Growing up with Greatest Generation parents I got a daily dose of their ethos “nobody’s going to do it for you,” “pull yourself up by your bootstraps,” “we’re all in this together,” etc. So when the opportunity to garden on this original Victory Garden came about I thought those lessons would be useful today. I get a pervading sense that people expect someone else to solve their problems - particularly where food is concerned and the related areas of health and nutrition. Seems to me the easiest way to cut to the chase and impact the problem was to teach people how to grow their own food. Basic, right? Or, as my Father used to tell me with one of his army sayings (edited to be more loving…) “KISS: Keep it Simple Sweetheart” The Victory Garden movement inspired me because huge amounts of people learned to grow food (90% of Chicago Victory Gardeners had never gardened before) and solve the problems of their time. Why not give people the skills and opportunity to do it again to solve the challenges of our times?
LaManda Joy’s new book, Start A Community Food Garden
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LaManda Joy wants to inspire everyone she meets to grow their own food... seriously. She is an author, national speaker, award winning master gardener and considered the "Best Urban Farmer in Chicago." Inspired by the massive WW2 Victory Garden movement she founded the Peterson Garden Project in 2010.
This award winning education and community gardening program utilizes empty urban property to create short-term organic gardens where thousands of people have the opportunity to learn how to grow their own food. Peterson Garden Project also operates a Community Cooking school to teach people how to cook their own food, too.
She has collaborated on Fearless Food Gardening in Chicagoland: A Month-by-month Guide for Beginners (2013) and Start a Community Food Garden: The Essential Handbook (2015).
LaManda has served on the board of the American Community Gardening Association, spoken at the Library of Congress, national conferences, garden shows, festivals, libraries and appeared on PBS and other media outlets and was featured in the documentary Food Patriots...Her rallying cry "We can grow it!" recognizes the influence of the past while invigorating the American can-do spirit to create a positive future.
Her home garden, The Yarden, has been featured in local and national news outlets and is the basis for her blog and Facebook presence TheYarden.com.
