October 1936

Across the Editor's Desk

NO MATTER where you go, you run across Better Homes & Gardens subscribers. While taking into the Canadian wilderness the canoe trip mentioned on this page in the July issue, I met two of them, looking like lumberjacks, tho they are professional men at home.

LOOKING IN ON THE FAMILY

THE Diary OF A PLAIN DIRT GARDENER

Oct. 4 Last night I arrived back home from a long business trip east, and after driving clear over the mountains I was too tired to pay any attention to the garden. But when I went out this morning the ground was covered white with an untimely frost, and that inevitable day of ruin had arrived-- annuals wilted down, rose buds sickly, tomatoes devastated, dahlias gone to heaven, early mums withered.

IT'S news TO ME!

TO PERK up the kitchen pridefully, here are color-matched kitchenwares.* Utensils, cooky and spice jars, oilcloth, spatulas, and spoons, like garden accents well planned, all match in the same gay Delphinium Blue!

A SENSATIONAL BILDCOST GARDENED HOME FOR

BUILDING or buying a home is a major step in any family's life. Hundreds of thousands of families with modest incomes would like to take that step. But how can they, unless and until a really complete, sound, sturdy home, large enough to meet their needs, can be built within their incomes?

WHEN GOOD PERIODS GET TOGETHER

Because We Love Nice Things

NOMINATED AND ELECTED--THE HOME

WE, THE founders of the Home Party, promise to maintain and promote home comfort wherever and whenever it is endangered by carelessness, poor taste, lack of vision, or false economy. We invite you to adopt our platform and join with us in our resolutions. If you do, in return we guarantee that this winter will bring to your home an abundance of comfort and happiness such as your family never before has known.

FURNISHINGS FOOTNOTES

HIGHLIGHTS ON Glassware

SECOND only to the diamond in its power to sparkle, when cut and polished in designs that break up the light rays, glass seems almost alive, and nothing adds quite as much to the beauty of our dinner tables. Yet when we set forth to buy glassware, few of us know enough about it to be sure we're getting the greatest possible value for our money.

.. ON Pottery

INTRODUCED first as a bright and cheerful note during the depression years, colorful pottery, or earthenware, for table service has climbed ever since into more and more popular favor. And while pottery-making as an art is one of the most ancient skills, its widespread use on the table is so new in this country, so many brands are being offered with such wide differences in price, that it's hard for us to judge the inferior pottery from the good, to tell which pieces will keep their beauty after years of use, and which will soon grow chipped, discolored, and unsightly.

PANELING POSSIBILITIES

EXAMINE any ancestral wooden paneling in the world and you'll find it's laid up in one of two forms. Either the builder has placed his wood in a series of vertical planks or he's placed small squares of wood in frames of wood. He built his paneling thus because these methods were the only ones in which small widths of wood could be placed without warping.

ADD A ROOM Outdoors

BEFORE you put the lawn-mower away for the winter and consider your gardening is over until 1937, spend a few moments in reminiscence of gardens you most enjoyed visiting this year. When you analyze them thoughtfully, there most likely will be one feature that helped give some of them appeal and a satisfying appearance-- an outdoor living-room.

Sorry, but you're wrong IF YOU BELIEVE THAT ...

EVERY TIME I Hear this charge repeated I'm reminded of the fond mother who, watching the regiment march by, observed --"Everyone's out of step but my John." It all depends, apparently, upon which boy or color our affections are centered.

BRING YOUR Bulb Problems TO THE CLINIC

YOU'VE seen them-- Paper-White Narcissus with floppy leaves and blasted buds, hyacinth flowers born prematurely, and anemic bulbs with no will to live. Perhaps this is the picture of bulbs you yourself have tried to force. Maybe you say you're not "lucky" with plants. But what's one failure, or many for that matter? Try again! Bring your bulb problems to the clinic, where the assembled opinions of authorities can help you to succeed.

How to Quarrel if You Must

I KNOW a madcap girl-- an extra hot-blooded, undisciplined, and largely uninhibited member of the "Younger Generation." She married a youth who was just like her, and then some. Both of them were uninhibited in a big way. They had quarreled violently and often before marriage; and marriage afforded them further inducement and unlimited opportunity for more quarreling.

THE MAN NEXT DOOR

"I know three brothers," says Les Gowan, "who pay taxes and want their brother-in-law, who's on the dole, to do some work for 'em around the house, hut he asks 'em, is he a slave?"

THE Question BEFORE THE HOUSE

ROSIN in small globules is exuding thru the paint on our weatherboarding. Can any preventive be applied?

PLANT Jeweled SHRUBS

SOMEHOW I feel that to have your shrubs in fall weigh down their branches I with a crop of sparkling berries is like getting a bonus check. It's not exactly unexpected, but when it comes you're temporarily giddy with the thought of it. After all, haven't your shrubs faithfully produced a generous display of flowers in the spring and made a substantial background of rich foliage for the rest of the season? But now, at this late hour, you're showered with a gorgeous display of berries!

TWELVE WAYS I USE Lilies

THE lily has just about everything you can demand of a flower-- fragrance, beauty, substance, grace, variety in height, form, color, and a long flowering season. In my own garden I've found a round dozen uses for the loveliness and fragrance of lilies. Yes, lilies are that adaptable. Some prefer sun, others shade; a few like moist soil, and many aren't fussy.

PRELUDE TO JUNE ROSES

FOR years I've been a rather vigorous advocate of planting roses in the fall, and I still am where matured plants can be had and where they can be so planted as to be carried safely over winter. Fall-planted bushes reveal a stamina in the spring which every rose-fancier knows will guarantee an abundant crop of blooms by June.

HE-MAN HOBBIES

WHEN police officers admit their weakness is tatting, and businessmen sit up all night to finish their embroidery, Mrs. Needleworker may pause from her knitting to wonder, "Surely that can't be in the United States, and not in 1936!"

Placing Youth in the World's Work

OUT of today's divergent movements for youth betterment emerges one striking fact: Youth in America has no concern with itself as such. It seeks only the good life, the American community life. Eagerly it allies itself with adult leadership if that leadership be comprehending and constructive.

ALL THE THINGS WE WANTED

WITHOUT destroying the cottage-- without even moving out except for one month-- we've added all the things we wanted. First, just boosting the house to facilitate plumbing repairs, we decided to utilize the old cellar for a rumpus room. Then we added a fireproof garage and laundry; remodeled the living-room, kitchen, and dining-room; next we added bedrooms, hobby and study rooms, and bathrooms aplenty.

Let's Plant Something New

POPEYE and his spinach are milk toast compared to the gardener's zest for life when he plants something new to look forward to. Autumn planting of something different generates expectancy and anticipation-- those life-giving vitamins that lift the spirit above fall and winter garden glums. New plants needn't necessarily be the season's novelties

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LET'S TAKE Inventory

WE'VE been following that prescription for several years and find that it's good both for our house and for us. It takes a little imagination to approach your own home with the eye of a stranger, looking at every detail critically as if you were a prospective buyer or tenant. You're likely to find things you wouldn't tolerate if the house weren't your own.

How Correct is ... Correct?

A CHAIR, a rug, or a dress isn't "correct" just because it happens to be fashionable at the moment. That's a use of the word, that's gotten us into a lot of trouble in home-furnishings and is fast becoming as individuality-blighting as "everyone's using it," and "it's not being done."

LET YOUR Boy or Girl Decide

WHY should Alice Albert run away from home? Her parents wanted badly to know. And so would you, if your 13-year-old daughter had fled from a pleasant home where she was loved and cherished.

"Him an' Me Started the Club"

WE OLDER folks appear to be making a mess of things. If we should dwell on the poverty, wrecked homes, crimes, accidents, and murders which fill the newspapers, we would become despondent, but the everlasting, refreshing buoyancy of boys and girls brings us back to hope and courage.

Tattle Tales

DAY AND NIGHT the pressroom at Meredith Publishing Company throbs with activity. Massive, rambling presses surge with the great duty that is theirs-- almost human they seem, despite their mechanical outline-- with a precision that's amazing. Paper from huge rolls is threaded thru their great frames with such a delicate touch that it isn't torn, guided carefully over the plates with a precision designed to get the very best job of printing on that paper-- and delivered as a finished product in stupendous quantities.

BOOKS ALSO DECORATE

BOOKS are among the most delightful things to be found on this old planet of ours. They're useful not only for their contents but also for the decorative quality of their exteriors. The soft colorings of fine old bindings give an air of dignity to any room, while the gayer covers and paper jackets of modern books seem to make a room "come alive," to give it individuality and warmth.

Book Care

AT FIRST thought, it would hardly seem necessary to do more than provide books with a bookcase. However, there are several kinds of bookcases. The open one without glass doors is in favor at present. There is much to be said for this style. Books can contribute a great deal to the decorative scheme because of their colors.

Filing at Home

THE methods of big business have come to the aid of the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker, but what about the home? The family Bible, cook book, and album held nearly all the records of Grandmother's home. The overflow went to the attic or those cubbyhole corners which have been eliminated in new or remodeled homes.

Shall We Join the Ladies?

ONE by one the barriers have been crashed. All territories formerly sacred to men have been invaded by women. Even the barrooms, barber- shops, and smoking cars on commuting trains-- the last three male strongholds-- have capitulated. The phrase "For Men Only" is a collector's item, of interest solely to the antiquarian. Everywhere a man goes he finds himself up to his elbows in women.

Fall Roundup for Better Kitchens

ENAMELWARE steamer (1) is a 2-compartment piece for 2-in-1 cooking. Simmer pot roast below and steam vegetables above in the inset pan. The deep-fat fryer (2) has frying basket that rests between dips on pan's rim as shown. If you've the deep-fat frying thermometer (3) you know whether your fat is at the temperature you want!

HOW Hot IS BROILING?

"BROILERS," some of my friends announce with finality, "are a nuisance. They smoke, they catch fire, they have to be watched continually, they demand attention just the minute guests arrive, and the heat from them makes the kitchen a bakehouse!"

SETTING PRETTY

INDIVIDUAL place mats lend charm and variety to gleaming table tops. Fresh, modern, easy to launder-- mats have a multitude of advantages. You can have loads of fun making them to suit your decorations or whimsy, and they're so inexpensive you can have as many as you like.

They're Twoing It Again

ALONG THE GARDEN PATH

DAFFODILS aren't just flowers; they're symbols. We must give the crocus credit. It takes courage to stick your head out in March. But I like to think-- no matter what the calendar may say-- that Spring has reluctantly climbed out of Winter's lap when the fragrance of the narcissus perfumes the still chilly air.