Evening star., 1932-09-04
$500 ACRES NOW
IN THRIFT GARDENS
&c. 100000 Yield Expected
for Employees of Ford
Motor Company.
BY A. M. SMITH.

Special Dispatch to The Star.
DETROIT, September 3.-Ford Of
ficials who have taken up the Ford
thrift garden idea modestly keep their
names out of print, but the thousands
of Ford employees and children in
schools, who have turned to the gar
dens supplied by donors Of land and
by Henry Ford are perfectly willing to
be talked about and photographed as
they WELD a wicked hoe"
Most of them work with grins as
they slay the weeds loosen top soil and
see almost everything human beings
need to eat popping right out Of the
garden plot is their storehouse against
days of hunger and need.
"Ten years ago we started seven vii
lage industries on small waterpower
sites, all within 20 miles of Dearborn,
our purpose being to combine the ad-
Vantages of city wages with country
living" Henry Ford said.
THE experiment has been con-
tinuous success. Overhead cost has
been less than that in the big fac
tory and the workers would not hear
of going back to the city shops. AS
they are free to till land in the grow
ing season. throughout these trying
times they have all remained seh-sus-
tanning Their security is produced by
machine and farm. not by one alone.
For a long time l have believed
that industry and agriculture are nat
ural partners and that they should
begin to recognize anc practice their
partnership. Each is suffering from
ailments the other can cure. Agricul-
ture needs a wider and steadier mar
ket; industrial workers need more end
steadier jobs. Can each be made to sup
ply what the other needs? I think So"
According to Ford officials, OF the
103,670 Ford employees in the United
States who might work garden plots
37,607 have their own gardens, 26,952
have applied for garden plots and to
these $4,000 gardens have been as
signed by the company. Eighty-nine
hundred acres are under garden cult
walton by these men, women and chill
dren, 6,4O0 owned personally, $500 as
signed by the company.
Real estate men who Subdivided acres
of land in the vicinity of Detroit have
co-operated with Mr.. Ford in turning
thousands of the unoccupied lots into
gardens. There are 1856 gardens thus
supplied and in these converted sub
divisions are only 219 open lots, these
not usable because of swampy land,
bad clay, sand or other conditions.
In the Dearborn area alone are 63,468
Ford employees who might be working
thrift gardens. OF these 23,233 have
their own gardens, 13,267 have garden
plots assigned to them and 1885 more
want gardens. The company assigned
in this area 1,700 acres for these pur-
poses and $500 acres are personal
property on which the gardens are
being worked under general Ford su-
pervision Numerous schools, foStered
by Mr.. Ford, have taken up the thrift
garden work
The town of Inkster has nearly every
available foot of ground raising vege-
tables The Inkster commissary store
has sold 600 dozen quart jars for can
ming so far this season. Will anybody
in Inkster go hungry this Winter?
At ST. Clair Shores there is new
regulation applied to wandering or resi-
dent folk who indulge in misdemean-
ers. They are given hoes and told
to 90 to work in the town garden pro-
yided by the police for this purpose.
In this area there are 652 lots con-
verted into gardens. Most of the peo-
pie working these had to have aid last
Winter. Now, Ford officials say, they
are ION their own" because of the gar
den work and occasional wage jobs.
When the rains do not suffice for these
gardens the st. Clair Shores firemen
get out with their hose and do the
sprinkling.
On an average of $50 the thrift gar
dens promoted by Henry Ford will yield
this year to the men, women and chill
dren working them an equivalent Of not
less than $3,360,000.
(Copyrigat, 1892. by North American News
paper Alliance, Inc)