October 1947

Mission Trail

Among Ourselves

Life's little problems, which harass most men, don't seem to bother Architect Michael Goodman, authority on regional planning. He just brushes them off.

We found storage in our tiny dining room

How to build a workbench

EVERYONE has a few tools. Sometimes they are kept in a drawer or box, but too often you'll find them-- if you can find them at all-- scattered all over the house. You should have a definite place to put them, and a place to use them.

Let every child go exploring in a house a-building

LET every child go exploring in a house a-building! It should, if possible, be a big house-- two stories, at least, with stairs he can climb, gingerly, because they seem so open and so scarey, and as steep as castle walls. And there should be the rectangular shape of windows, squaring off sky and dipping birds and trees to his gaze like a picture frame.

Our kitchen was a sight!

IF YOU have ever walked into a prospector's cabin in Alaska, deserted for years, you'll know what we faced. The house we remodeled in Dublin, Ohio, had long been vacant. Windows had been left open, allowing squirrels free rein. The kitchen, filled with antiquated equipment, was our toughest job.

I hate to work!

LISTEN, fellows, let's get together and stop all this nonsense. I'll bet you have been reading a lot of articles such as "So You Want to Build a Doghouse on Your Roof for Your Airedale" or "So You Want to Build a Tunnel Under Your Basement to Keep It Dry."

Garden lamps extend hospitality

GARDEN CLINIC

You can make cuttings now and still get blooms this winter. Cuttings should be made front disease- free parts of your plants, and each cutting can be dipped into a nicotine sulfate solution to kill insects. Pour 1 teaspoon of nicotine sulfate into 1 gallon of water, and add 2 tablespoons of soap powder.

What makes your wife a worrier?

"FOR gosh sakes," a distracted young husband asked me the other day, "what makes women brood? With men, once a fight's finished, it's finished. We seem to forgive and forget a lot easier than you dames. Men so often come home at night feeling fine, only to be met by a little Mrs. looking as if she's about to consult Mr. Anthony. What goes on in women's heads all day, anyway?

The house where I was born

I REMEMBER, I remember the house where I was born, Its width was ne'er an inch too wide, its length a foot too long, Each inch and foot was standardized like meter in a song.

When is an old house worth what it costs?

WITH new homes few and costly, lots of people are being tempted-- or compelled-- to turn to the secondhand market for a roof. For them, a prayer and a few words of caution.

A simple new idea brings you furniture that is Custom-built but moderately priced

IN THE bookshelves, cabinets, and chest shown in these rooms and in the pieces on pages 102 and 104, you see a singularly successful idea: mass-produced furniture that can be fitted to your house as if it were custom-built.

NO ROOM IS TOO SMALL FOR Dark Walls

TAKE the Coomers' house for instance. It was a typical five-room house when Mark and Sally Coomer bought it. The living-room walls were a mousy beige, the bedroom a faded blue.

Have a garden bright with bulbs

NOTHING'S quite so gay as tulips and shining, nodding daffodils when the green starts creeping back into the trees. Add to these lush, sweet-smelling hyacinths, and small colonies of bubble-like crocuses in purple, white, orchid, and gold. Tuck in some intrepid little scillas bluer than a March sky. Add snowdrops to open before the bluebirds and robins come again. You'll have a spring flower show, one that lasts for weeks, to say nothing of the blooms you cut for friends.

Lawn Secrets that cost $1,000,000

SUPER CITY

NEW YORK is a city of superlatives. It has the largest population of any city on this continent. It has the newest shows, latest hats, tallest buildings. It also has this country's swankiest night clubs, largest art collection, snootiest doormen, most notorious slums, and what will be its biggest Gothic cathedral.

A spreading house that fits a city lot

THE rambling, one-story, ranchtype house, economical to build and easy to live in, is gaining wide popularity. But only rarely has such a house been successfully modified for use on a small city lot.

Dress-Up Buffet

THERE'S something about serving yourself at a buffet that's friendly, and comfortably informal. But that's no reason dress-up meals can't be served buffet style, too. Their elegance lies in the accessories you use and the food you serve.

"We'll Take Traditional"

FOR months we have been in a deep blue quandary. Very soon now our family of six is going to have a new home (the present one is bulging at the seams). Architecturally it will be something low and rambling, comfortably informal, neither strictly Modern nor strictly Traditional, just a good American house. And we need all new furnishings for it.

What Are YOUR CHANCES AGAINST ARTHRITIS?

FOUR years ago in a Philadelphia hospital, lay a woman so crippled with rheumatoid arthritis that her hands were like claws. Her spine was rigid, her feet knotted, her legs bent at right angles to her knees. For a year she had been bedfast, unable even to feed herself. Massage, heat, vaccine, and X-ray had done no good.

Four homes that take to the hills

IF YOU own a hilly lot, and don't take full advantage of the slope when you build a home, you're missing an opportunity for individuality that comes once in a house lifetime.

How to garden on a hill

For a smooth-running kitchen

How to make a flower picture

Nail-biters need understanding

SCOLDING, punishing, or putting peppery solutions on your child's fingernails won't stop his nail-biting.

DON'T

How to take care of your dishes

FINE dinnerware is made to be used and enjoyed as often as you set your table. Its real value lies in its use as an attractive part of everyday family life. If you leave it stored in the china closet except on special occasions, you're losing much of the value of owning fine table furnishings.

New Kitchens With Ideas for You

New or Old, A kitchen can suit you

Color curtains our dining-room windows

She rebelled against an obsolete kitchen!

Looks like 18th century acts like modern

UNTIL now you've had to choose between the flexibility of Modern and the long-loved styles of Eighteenth Century.

How to freeze cooked sweet potatoes

Cluster your mums in a basket

Flowers by Self-Serve?

GROWING PAINS

When we moved into a new home that was surrounded by a large lot, we children were told that it would be our job to rake the lawn and garden.

This is French provincial

We eat at a bar ...and don't like It!

THIS is the story of our breakfast bar-- why we installed it, and why we intend to remove it.

Before: They had floor space Now they have living space

Name it-- and you can have it!

SUPPOSE you were buying the following items, sight unseen, at a War Assets Administration sale. Indicate by checking one of the three alternatives, how you would most logically use each article. If you don't know what it's for, you don't get the item.

I never house-clean!

AS AN ex-bobby-soxer (who married at the ripe old age of 19 and still loves it at an ancient and decrepit 24), I've probably shocked more staid homemakers with the statement, "I never house-clean," than any article on juvenile delinquency ever could.

Radio Party

What Do You Know About Dyeing?

Dyeing one color over another is essentially the same as mixing two colors. The general rule is that light and medium colors will combine to give a third color, while very dark colors will cover the original color. Blue over yellow will give green; pink over blue will give orchid, etc.

Make a Petticoat for Your Bed

"DUST ruffles," decorators call them, those full, gathered petticoats that hang down from under an heirloom quilt. They look pretty whether made of flowered chintz to match the draperies, or of beruffled organdy like the glass curtains. They're easy to make, too, for it takes only simple machine or hand sewing to put them together in professional style.

Money for Recipes

HERE'S your chance to cash in on that quick cake recipe made in half the time, or that spring vegetable fix-up your family, friends, and relatives eat with such relish. We're offering $70. Twenty-one cooks can win. If your recipe wins the most votes from our judges, that's $10 and Dish-of-the-Month honors for you when we salute the winners next May.

Do your traffic lanes jam?

GET OUT OF THE Fire Insurance Business

IF YOU came home tonight and found your home ablaze, you might learn tomorrow-- when you reported a big loss-- that you'd been engaged in a private fire insurance business of your own. For, since three out of four residences are under-insured today, many of them seriously so, your present fire insurance may not be enough to provide a satisfactory settlement if you have a big fire.

Confessions of Good Cooks

Biscuit doughnuts make individual rings to hold creamed chicken or berry shortcake. I cut the biscuits with a large cooky cutter, then make the center holes with a 'small cutter. The center holds just enough a-la-king mixture or fruit for one serving.

Barbecued Spareribs

Better Homes and Gardens

I use my antiques every day

Connecticut farmhouse on a Hollywood set

What Is Home?

TODAY is an anniversary in our family. Just one year ago my husband, my children, and I walked into our own home, and saw, for the first time alone, without agents or former owners, the sunlight warm on our own floors and the leaves of our own maples thru the kitchen window.

Now you can protect your passengers, too

EVER since the earliest days of the "horseless carriage," owners of automobiles have taken insurance to protect themselves in case they injured pedestrians and passengers in other vehicles in a collision or accident. But, curiously enough, it wasn't until recently that you could get such insurance protection for passengers inside your own car.

They rescued their old buffet

How to fix a chair

Sitting pretty in a pretty setting

We worked our friends--then played

EVER play shuffleboard? It's fun-- not too difficult, not too strenuous. Two or four can play at one time. Unlike darts, it's harmless. Unlike croquet, it doesn't ruin a lawn. Unlike tennis, the court dries rapidly after a rain.

Hints for the Handy Man

HERE'S one way to solve the closet shortage by increasing the capacity of the ones you have. Place two lengths of broomstick lengthwise. Support between them, at a 45-degree angle, shorter pieces of broomstick, by means of large hooks in the ends.

What makes your children jealous?

JEALOUSY, in some form or other, is at the bottom of much unhappiness. In-law trouble, marital complications, dislike between brothers and sisters may all be due to jealousy.

Hints for the Handy Man

Vibration-stopper. Attic fans are sometimes noisy. Usually the noise can be traced to vibration. Two old pieces of tire casing, bolted to motor feet and nailed to rafters, silence vibration and keep the fan belt tight, because the casings collapse under the weight of the motor.

We dare you--

Brighten rooms with easy-to-clean plastics

We found a better way to live

THREE years ago my husband and I, with $50 capital, started a venture which today is valued by bank examiners at $10,000.

OCTOBER GARDEN GUIDE

OCTOBER is a grand month in the garden. You can still enjoy your chrysanthemums, anemones, and heleniums while doing practically every kind of garden planting.

Birds, Too, Have Favorite Fruits!

BIRDS, whether insect- or seedeaters, often depend upon plants for life. It's easy to attract birds to your garden with plants chosen from the ones suggested here. You can plant them now to have fruit next year.

THE DIARY OF A Plain Dirt Gardener

Oct. 1 When I am dead and gone from this world, maybe the family will remember me longest as the old duffer who used to get up early on cold mornings and make the house warm for them.

Bright ideas for dull lamp shades

TIRED of the same old lamp shades? Here are some ideas for transforming your weary has-beens into the bright room accessories they should be.

They put their corners to work

Plants that tell history

THE tradition began when we dug up a little plant that had sprouted from a fragrant mockorange at our old family home in Connecticut.

Maybe they had something

Take the sandman with a grain of caution!

DOES your 3-year-old Jackie toss or twitch in his bed? Does 8-year-old Patty talk in her sleep, cry out at night, or wet the bed? If so, it may be because they're getting too much sleep or spending too much time in bed.

Garden rooms to prolong summer

THE sooner you plan and furnish a spot for relaxed outdoor living, the better. You'll eat more meals outside-- easy suppers with corn cakes and fresh plum butter followed by mugs of coffee sipped while you watch the big orange moon climb into the sky.

Keep that door working right!

WHEN a door binds, find out where. If it binds anywhere along the edges marked (1), swelling of the wood is probably the cause. A little work with a plane or sandpaper will relieve the difficulty.

Banish the bogey of acid soil

ACID soil should cause you no worry. Most garden plants thrive only when the soil is acid! Excess acidity, tho, naturally is bad. Fortunately, it is rare in most parts of the country. If you have tried to grow the acid-soil plants-- azaleas, rhododendrons, gardenias, and camellias-- you are aware that few soils are naturally acid enough for them.

Old-fashioned fun still costs little

TO BEAT the high cost of living, try staying at home to have your fun. It can take a lot of groans out of your budget (and tempts teenagers away from less desirable entertainment). Give it a fair try, and I'll bet you'll say everyone had a better time than he's had in years.

Don't forget to winterize your dog!

IT WON'T be long till winter. We can don heavier clothing, sit by the fire, and otherwise make ourselves immune from coldweather ailments-- we hope.

For kitchen corners

How to make spots vanish

IF A new wool suit or your best rayon dress gets stained, you'd better send it to the dry cleaner. Pin a label on the spot telling what it is, and let a professional do the job.

Thru the Shops WITH BETTER HOMES & GARDENS

Does Rain Give Your House a Black Eye?

THE next time you and the family go for a ride around town, keep your eye out for white frame houses. On many of them you'll notice streaks of dirt on the walls under windows and eaves. Maybe you don't need to look far. These same streaks may disfigure your own home.

THE MAN NEXT DOOR

They have more company and more house guests at the little brick bungalow around the corner than at the biggest house in town.... As my grandmother used to say, "If there's room in the heart, there's room in the house."