It was not until after several years that the full effect of the work was realized.  A few gardeners each year from the beginning have, after one or two years’ experience, taken small farms or plots of land to cultivate on their own account, or have sought employment on farms near the city; but the number is quite small compared to the whole number helped.  Now more than ten per cent of those that had gardens previously have for the last two years been working on their own account.  Out of nearly eight hundred gardeners, more than eighty-five either rented or secured the loan of gardens that season and cultivated them wholly at their own expense, and many others would have done so had suitable land been available.  The number of gardens forfeited on account of poor cultivation or trespassing was only two out of 800 plots given out.

The first important advance was early in the spring of 1904, when it became known that a large tract of land that had been in gardens for several years would be withdrawn from use.  A number of the gardeners came together to talk over the situation.  One proposed that they form a club to lease a tract of land and divide it up among themselves.  The plan was readily agreed to, and a nine-acre tract on Lansdowne Avenue was rented at $15 per acre per annum.  Some sixteen families became interested’ and Mr. D. F. Rowe, who had been one of the most successful gardeners, became manager They had the land thoroughly fertilized and plowed, and then subdivided.  Some took separate allotments, as under the Vacant Lot Association’s plan, and others worked for the manager at an agreed rate of wages per hour.  The whole nine acres were thoroughly well cultivated, and a magnificent crop harvested.

As soon as there was produce for sale, a market was established on the ground and a regular delivery system organized which later attracted much attention.  It was carried on by the children, of nine to twelve years of age, from the various families.  Each child was provided with a pushcart.  There were many and various styles, made from little express wagons, baby coaches, and produce boxes

The children built up their own routes, and went regularly to their customers for orders.  They made up the orders, loaded them into their little pushcarts, charged themselves up with the separate amounts in a small book, and at the end of each day’s sales each child settled with the manager and was paid his commission (twenty per cent of the receipts) in cash.  These little salesmen and salesgirls often took home four to five dollars per week and yet never worked more than three to five hours per day.  The work was done under such circumstances that to them it was not work but play.  You can get the full report from the Philadelphia “Vacant Lot Cultivation Associations.”  It’s interesting.

“The greatest value that our little garden has brought us,” said a French woman, mother of a goodly number of rather small children, “has not been in the fine vegetables it has yielded all summer, or the good times that I and the children have had in the open air, but in the glasses of beer and absinthe that my husband hasn’t taken.”  “Quite right, mother, quite right,” came from a man near by.  “The world can never know the evil we men don’t do while we are busy in our little gardens.”