The following story is the seventh installment in a new series we’re calling "10 Stories of Transition in the US." Throughout 2018, to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Transition Movement here in the United States, we will explore 10 diverse and resilient Transition projects from all over the country, in the hope that they will inspire you to take similar actions in your local community.
During the first two world wars, governments in the US, Europe, and Australia promoted the development of "victory gardens" to increase food productivity and free up resources to support their respective war efforts. It is estimated that these victory gardens, planted and cultivated in the yards of ordinary citizens, yielded an amount of fruits and vegetables equal to contemporary commercial farms. Gardeners were also encouraged to keep backyard chickens for eggs and soil fertilization. To return this sense of empowerment, food sovereignty, and resilience to the people, Transition Milwaukee helped to launch and incubate the Victory Garden Initiative, which recently celebrated installing its 4,000th garden.
When Victory Garden Initiative founder Gretchen Mead first moved to Milwaukee to serve as a social worker in a child and adolescent psychiatric unit, her eyes were opened to how the Standard American Diet ("SAD," as she calls it) was contributing to her young patients' mental health issues. Then, in 2008, as a member of Transition Milwaukee’s initial steering group, Mead proposed a program to develop front-yard gardens as a way to cultivate a more socially-just and sustainable food system. Because Transition Milwaukee was focused at that time on responding to a deepening financial crisis, climate change, and peak oil, they quickly embraced victory gardens as a strategy that would help them meaningfully address all of these concerns at once.
The Victory Garden Initiative launched with a Memorial Day Blitz, installing 40 gardens over the three-day weekend (35 of which were completed in a single day). Although the core group organizing this program began with just eight people, nearly 100 turned out to volunteer, as gardens were planted in yards, at schools and churches, and even on rooftops.
To read more of Steve McAllister's article, please click here.
Photo and caption credit:
Participants in the Victory Garden Initiative's Youth Education Program. All photos courtesy of www.victorygardeninitiative.org.
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