October 1929

The Mystery in an Autumn Leaf

ALONG the GARDEN PATH

AUTUMN is in the air. Clouds succeed each ray of sunshine. it is the season of fulfillment. Seeds and fruits are ripening. Buds are being covered by fur coats. The wild beasts are storing food. Man is changing his summer habits. It is the time for contemplation.

The Diary of a Plain Dirt Gardener

OCTOBER 3. On this day I doffed overalls and hickory shirt, temporarily at least, and hied me down the eight miles of river road to the old think factory, where once again I became a university professor. But bless my soul, I was home early and out in the garden by 4 o'clock, as is my wont.

The Creation of a Home Proportion

WHAT do you consider the basis of the successful home, Mother?" my young daughter who is just making one of her own asked me. "You must have something besides recipes to pass on to me. Tell me and other young homemakers what your experience has taught you."

A Well-gardened Home of Old Virginia

THE blending of the home with the garden is an old and a basic problem. It is so well solved by the early homemakers of France and England that we come back from having seen their villages with a sense of ineffable charm. On analysis we find that this charm is created by the suitable association of house with lawn and foliage, and best of all, with flowers.

Treated in a Typical English Manner

IN THIS day and age of outdoor life, when the hue and cry of all modern-minded individuals is to seek the out-of-doors whenever possible, what could be more satisfying to a home owner than to possess a garden that truly reflects his knowledge of what the relation between his house and garden should be?

American Bulbs That Beat the Dutch

APRIL is tulip time in the Willamette Valley. Up and down from the McKenzie River to the Columbia, from the Cascade Mountains to the Coast range, tulips in their shades of red and yellow, pink and blue, bronze and purple, will majestically nod their heads.

Praiseworthy Bulbs in the Home

DO YOU remember late last winter when you saw those lovely narcissus, hyacinths, and tulips blooming in a friend's house while the snow covered the out-of-doors? And do you recall that resolution you made to grow some in your own home next spring? The time has come when you must act if you would fulfill that wish.

The Schoolhouse That Became a Home

YEARS ago there was an unexpected holiday for the school children who took their learning in a little stone house tucked in between the hills of a very rural section of Chester County, Pennsylvania. It was one of those occasions which most country boys have dreamed pleasantly about, one of those events so often hoped for behind the arduous pages of a geography without the slightest expectation that such could ever actually happen --the schoolhouse burned down!

David Starr Jordan Defines Garden

"Mother, I've decided on a middle name!"

With the Junior Garden Clubs of AMERICA

I AM WONDERING how many Junior Garden Club members still have some late flowers in their gardens. In my garden there are just a few flaming marigolds, bravely holding their tawny heads above their tarnished leaves.

PARENTS SHOULD KNOW

FEW people listen patiently to another's experience, but I believe that a college teacher who has worked with college freshmen, especially, is in a unique position to formulate some general observations with respect to child rearing, and the advantage of the college teacher's point of view is obvious.

Symbols of Home and Happiness

WHEN we approach the habitations of mankind, our first glimpse is of dwelling-house roofs in silhouette against the sky, and the accents of this silhouette are the chimneys, with their smoke rising upward into the blue.

There's Magic in Wallpaper

IT IS easy enough to create a charming room if we can plan it and build it, open a bursting pocketbook and furnish it with no restrictions, and have to consider no permanent obstacles. It takes a clever woman to overcome existing faults in her room, to use old materials and make them harmonize with each other, and to do both these things without spending a fortune in the doing.

Furniture Periods That Combine

A HOUSE designed for the sunny days and the bright skies of the Mediterranean is likely to look ridiculous on a snow-covered New England hillside; it has, however, a comfortable sense of Tightness when its white- stucco walls are silhouetted against the brown hills and overlook the blue stretch of the Pacific; or when it is nestled in the sand and among the palms of Florida.

The Parade of Gay-colored Lilies

SCARLET lilies! Fascinating! Captivating! Who could be insensible to their compelling witchery? They are as irresistible charmers as the Pied Piper of old! We are completely under their magical spell!

Getting Started Right With the Baby

AS I THINK back over the articles that have appeared in the magazine, it seems to me that we have rather neglected the babies. Not from intent, but because so many things about the older child seemed crowding to be said. Now, when we are talking about mental health, we simply cannot overlook the baby. The things that happen to him are the keystone of the arch, mentally even more than physically.

Putting Variety Into Meals

THE homemaker's cry of "What shall we have to eat today?" is as old as the ages. In spite of the fact that countless books have been written, filled with recipes to answer this question, and magazines are offering help in every month's issue, still, as useful as all this material is-- and without it what should we do?

A Chat About Curtains

WHILE we are waiting for that home that is to be built to our taste, we must needs put up with places that are not as perfect as we would like them to be. With some few of us the trend of our lives is such that we are likely to change our residence every few years or so. But, nevertheless, there is always a way of meeting every situation and making the best of it, no matter how unattractive a house may seem.

Bringing Sunlight Into the Kitchen

DO YOU have a room in your home into which too little sunlight penetrates? If so, you must arrange to get the effect of sunlight or brightness in some other way.

New Dresses for Your Bed

WELL, why not plagiarize a little bit-- isn't love of home all bound up with love of country? And haven't the women of all time bravely carded and combed and spun and wove while their jousting spouses went galavanting off to do battle, with standards waving and lances flickering!

Autumn Suggests Hostess Aids

BY THE end of September, vacations and outdoor activities are largely at an end, and parties, club meetings, and informal entertaining occupy most of the social calendar. It is not so easy to find new recipes, or even new methods of preparing the familiar ones.

WRITE US FOR OUR HELP

That Paper You Must Write

WHEN I first mapped out my book articles for the year, I named this one, rather too confidently, "When Clubs Begin to Plan."

A Prune, a Sailor, and a Girl

Choice Shrubs for Southern California

WHEN a person moves from the East to California, he is bewildered by the great variety of unusual plants found in the gardens. The names are strange, and the value of each is quite unknown. Naturally, each Easterner desires a few shrubs with which he is familiar; that is, Weigelia, snowball, Flowering Almond, and mockorange, or syringa, as it is called.

Readers and Pools

SOMETIMES we believe it will be necessary to publish a monthly supplement to Better Homes and Gardens and call it "Backyard Lily Pools," so great is the interest in these beauty spots, and so large the number of letters and photographs which we receive about them.

Billboards or Beauty

"HANDSOME is as handsome does," is an adage so hoary with age that seldom do we more than smile when we hear it. But occasionally it proves itself to be as true today as it was in the days of Methuselah, or whoever the gentleman was who first used the phrase.

Built-in Wardrobes Supplant Closets

BUILT-IN wardrobes are supplanting closets in modem homes. Wardrobes take only half the space usually considered necessary for closets, yet, if properly designed and fitted, they offer fully as much useful storage capacity.

Wherever You Live--Try Grapes

EVERY gardener should have a hobby. Perhaps you already have one, and have experienced the keen satisfaction of raising finer delphinium or tomatoes or plums than any of your neighbors can produce. But if you have not yet concentrated your interest on any one thing, try grapes.

California Bulb-planting Time

Chrysanthemums in a Garden

THERE is a possibility that in the near future we may have a race of Chrysanthemums that will better suit our conditions than the varieties which we have at present. It has been reported that the Department of Agriculture is devoting itself to breeding early- flowering Chrysanthemums from the best of the English sorts, and at least one of these Washington seedlings, a single dark red, has been released.

City Services Wherever You Live

BECAUSE most of us have spent years where water supply and sewage disposal is merely a matter of hooking up to municipal systems, we forget all about these essentials to modern civilization; that is, we forget these things until we find ourselves in possession of a summer camp or cottage, or what is more likely, a home beyond the incorporation limits, where there is plenty of elbow room.

CHILD-STUDY COURSES FOR MOTHERS' CLUBS

DO YOU LIKE THE COVER PAINTING?

A Club Report

MONTCLAIR is a small school, consisting of only the first four grades, but it is a unit of the very large educational system in the city of Oakland, California.

Methods of Storing Surplus Vegetables

IT SEEMS to me that I have tried at least fifty-eight varieties of storage, some good, but mostly bad. At last, in my home, I have devised a place to keep things fresh thruout the winter.

Come to the Garden Clinic

OCTOBER is the great bulb-planting month of the year. It is now that we can do more to secure spring garden effect than during any other one month. Bulbs, then, should be the center of interest and planted in profusion and variety.

VALUABLE LEAFLETS

Teach Your Community Musical Expression

THE cultural and educational value of music as an organized community activity cannot be overestimated. For the last ten years we have been, and are now, in a period of musical reconstruction such as no country in the world has known in all its history.

Model Airplanes Your Boy Can Build

AS PARENTS and educators, one of our duties is to keep our boys busy. The boy with a full program has little time, and even less incentive, to get into trouble. Right here is where the home workshop may serve by furnishing interesting and worthwhile entertainment for him.

Tips for the Handy Man

When the Pear Limbs Die

IF THE tips of branches on that favorite pear tree in the back yard have given indications of dying during the summer, do not neglect to take action this fall. Your tree probably has fire -blight, a destructive disease that is likely to ruin it in one or two seasons unless drastic action is taken.

A Pergola of Small Price

MY PERGOLA did not have its inception in an hour spent with some intriguing garden-accessory catalog. It was not the result of a desire to beautify the landscape about our home or form a feature of a garden vista. It was born of strict necessity.

Landscape Tips for Texas Gardeners

PERHAPS I can offer a few suggestions that will help those that are anxious to plan and plant their grounds and arc not able to pay the usual price for professional plans.

The Children's Pleasure Chest

DEAR Boys and Girls: All the letters and stories that you send to me are so interesting! I'm always so happy to hear from you, because you have so many fine things to tell me about. Just keep it up. Whenever we can use a letter or story in the magazine, the writer receives a check for $2, just as Roberta and Doris and Mary Frances, whose stories appear in this issue, did.

The Legend of the Lucretia Dewberry

ACROSS THE EDITOR'S DESK

MY VACATION wanderings took me thru the city of Huntington, Indiana, where a noteworthy thing has been done by the community builders.