April 1936

Article

Across the Editor's Desk

THE NEW YORKER magazine, contemplating the propagation of a new 65-petaled nasturtium, gnashes its teeth, shouting, "Like everything else in the world, you're running nasturtiums into the ground."

THE Diary OF A PLAIN DIRT GARDENER

(Dear Editor: I'm in a predicament. As I come to translate my original diary into usable copy, I find that the dates of April 1-3 and for several other April days are absolutely blank. Further, my humble mind is in same inadequate state of blankness regarding such dates, as Charlie Chan would put it.

IT'S News TO ME!

SKETCHED is the new breakfast-nook shelf Nick built. It holds coffee-maker, toaster, waffle iron-- allows us more table space. The two-tiered shelf is no trick for a handy man. John Normile told Nick how to make it-- we'll send you directions for a 3-cent stamp.

WALK INTO THE GARDENED HOME ON THE COVER

NO, WAIT a minute. Let's first, like those folks on the cover, take some round-and-about looks at it. Almost at once, as you take in all its features, we believe you'll notice that it caters to varying moods. The mere idea of a two-story vine-and flower-covered porch, for instance, establishes, doesn't it, a standard of dignity you feel should be lived up to?

THIS IS THE WAY WE'VE GARDENED IT

YOU'LL notice at once that the landscaping has been developed in an unaffected and refined manner, reflecting and in keeping with the personality of the house. You'll be delighted too, we feel sure, with the many surprises which crop up here and there-- the mirror-like pool and Colonial benches in the evergreen garden (7), the old-fashioned pump in the hobby garden (3), the fireplace and shelves for books under the grape-arbor (shown in the photograph above), and in the fragrant garden (1) an old-fashioned copper kettle which has been made into a sundial.

Gigantic Servants for the Home

AND now won't you inspect some of the up-to-the-minute conveniences in the gardened home on the cover? Of course, the good news about them all is that you can have them in any home, new or old. We expect our homes to be well built and well designed, but it's today an effort to keep abreast with the innumerable mechanical servants and ingenious arrangements and gadgets which can so economically be incorporated or added to our homes. Many of them are so small and unobtrusive they don't attract immediate notice, but once you have and use them they assume gigantic propor tions in your daily homekeeping routine.

LEAVES FROM OUR HOME-FURNISHING Not Book

STRAIGHT from the garden came our inspiration for these color harmonies. While Verna Cook Salomonsky, who designed the home, and John Normile, Better Homes & Gardens' architect-editor, pored over blueprints, and while Alfred Hottes, garden editor, and Carl Frye, our consulting landscape architect, located trees and turnips, I lined up our best-loved blossoms-- and borrowed their colors for the rooms!

Glorious Magnolias

WHAT beauty and what loveliness is yours if you have in springtime such a picture as this framed in one of your living-room or dining-room windows! Yes, I know, most of you think the magnolia is a tree of the warmer climates-- something to read about and to see on trips to the sunny Southland, but never to have for your own.

Gay, Golden Gardens

WHENCE came that odious phrase "a streak of yellow"?-- not from any person aware of Nature's color schemes nor from any gardenlover, who well knows it takes yellow to make his garden gay.

My Hobby Vegetable Garden

MY HOBBIES are numerous, but none has afforded me more enjoyment, healthful outdoor exercise, and pleasant anticipation than has my vegetable gar den. It's a small back-yard plot, but on it, by careful planning and successive plantings, I manage to raise an incredibly large supply of fine vegetables which help materially to maintain the family's health and budget.

Man's Blind Attack on Nature

NATURE is man's best friend, and yet man, as soon as he's civilized, as we quaintly express it, wages relentless and successful war against her. He's laid waste empires of beautiful and productive landscape, blindly rushing ahead in a short-sighted, suicidal policy of exploitation and in pronoting cock-eyed, unsound, and unnecessary projects labeled "water-power conservation," "drainage," "reclamation," and "flood control," destroying more than he's produced.

Easter Bouquet

LIKE a silver-noted bugle urgently sounding reveille, it is waking every sleeping spirit; it is calling the entire world from its long, wintry sleep to arise and greet the glory, the raging splendor of ten million blossoms.

A Good Roof THE CROWNING GLOR

A ROOF, according to the dictionary, is a "covering for a building which affords protection to the interior."

The Other $1,000 Sweepstakes Prizewinner

Everybody Loves Them

"OOOH-- VIOLETS!... Look white ones, too!" Soon, I think, we'll be calling that the garden spring song. For just everybody sings it. It's chanted daily, for weeks, by small neighbors from over the hill who come with their eager little voices, their big round eyes, each small person a self-elected garden guide who stops before each patch exclaiming, "Vi'lets-- see 'em?"

THE MAN NEXT DOOR

Chivalry may be dead, but most husbands still concede their wives' right to sleep nearest the window in summer and farthest away from it in the wintertime.

Club Program--INDIANA STYLE

IN THE Club Department files is an envelope labeled Program Recipes, filled with the programs you so generously send me. What a heart-warming experience it is to scan them! Good or not so good, each is the record of a year's effort toward better community life.

CLUB-PROGRAM MENUS

Artcraft ACCENT ON YOUTH

WHEN it came to selecting artcraft offerings for the Easter season, our sympathies went all young and tender.

Tattle Tales

THE postman's whistle shrills and you go to the door to receive a cheery "Good Morning!" and your new April issue of Better Homes & Gardens, addressed, mailed, and delivered fresh from the press into your hands-- a service you've never given a thought; simply taken for granted... and why not?

Nature Takes the Honors

THERE is an intriguing interest that distinguishes a stained shingled home. It seems to fit as gracefully into nature's settings as if it had been planted there. But that isn't the only reason why investigative home planners and remodelers have always been attracted to stained shingles.

Supper Set-Up

A TABLE and benches for outdoor suppers are a real asset when the weather's suitable, but what to do with them in winter often is a problem.

Making Sure of Your Pension

WILL H., tho long employed by a large company which has for many years given generous pensions to its retired employees, recently bought a retirement annuity from a life-insurance company.

"Koo-chook!"

WHEN Columbus came to the West Indies he saw the natives playing ball with a sticky substance that would bounce. The natives called it "caoutchouc." If you will say "koo chook," accent the first syllable, and sneeze as you say it, you'll get the idea.

The Love Light IN THEIR EYES

WHAT'S come over Alicia? All thru the grades she led her classes, but now that she's a sophomore in high school, something's happened.

Spring Bonnet for You!

THE darlingest hat, but no five-dollar bill? Then buy the hat with a recipe! Better Homes & Gardens will pay $5 for the most tempting warm-weather recipe received during April.

Round Table Honor Roll

Your Kitchen "As You Like It"

YOU'VE all been touched by the sad story of the apple pie. It comes flanked by a depressing "before" and a thrilling "after" picture of a kitchen. Dramatic footprints show how, in the old, villainously arranged kitchen, the weary mealmaker trotted from refrigerator to table, to sink, to cupboard, to table, to range, and to back porch, laying a maze of tracks that look like the aftermath of an Indian powwow.

Your Kitchen "As You Like It"

Again this year counters are following the three-work-center plan approved by kitchen experts. The Refrigerator, Storage, and Preparation Center is near the delivery entrance. The Range and Serving Center is near the dining-room door. In between comes the Sink and Dishwashing Center.

How to Catch Moles

TEN years ago we built our home on land at the edge of a large woods. First, I started a vegetable garden, edging it with a few rows of tulips and other bulbs. They were to be my first joy in the new garden.

How Do YOU Pronounce Them?

"A Little Big House That Has Everything"

Co-operating With Better Homes & Gardens

To Your Colors!

BECAUSE insipid pastel colors are so often used in decorating painted furniture, it's refreshing to see a breakfast room like this one, carried out in the true peasant manner, in the Beverly Hills, California, home of Michael Curtiz, motion-picture director who produced, you may remember, "British Agent," "Black Fury," and "Captain Blood."

Co-operating With Better Homes & Gardens

That Bold, Bad 2-Year Old

Salads for Madame

Mrs. Renaker Is Mistaken

FROM Mrs. Renaker, of Kentucky comes a letter which contains this paragraph:

$10 FOR A WEED

TEN dollars for a weed in the lawn, and I couldn't find one! John Kakakes, Better Homes & Gardens reader, is winner of the first prize in the National Yard and Garden Contest in the class where all the work is done by the family. He told me there wasn't a weed in his grass plots and backed his assertion with the cash offer.

Who Has the Finest Home Grounds in America?

"Let's Get Into the Garden"

Article

"Garden Veils"

Plants Watch the Clock

I WONDER why some plants have a definite blooming period, while others seem to come into flower any month of the year provided it isn't too cold to allow growth.

"Planning a Pool This Spring?"

A LONG THE GARDEN PATH

IF A dog bites the hand that's fed it, that's hardly news. But if the hand bites back, you have headlines. Something similar has just happened to me.