"July 1943. WWII. Rationing. Canned
food went to troops. Fresh food barely made it to cities. USDA said: “Plant
Victory Gardens. Feed yourselves.”
In McPherson County, Kansas, the men
were gone — drafted or working war plants in Wichita. Left behind: 42 widows,
average age 67, all from German Mennonite families. Their kids called them the
“Garden Grandmas.”
Problem: no men to plow. No gas for
tractors. County had 1 horse left — blind in one eye.
So Grandma Hilda Penner, 71,
organized them. They used push plows from 1890. Hooked 4 grandmas to a plow
like oxen. Took turns. 6 AM to 9 PM. They broke 18 acres behind the church.
Planted everything: potatoes, beans, cabbage, onions. No fences, so they slept
in shifts with brooms to beat off rabbits and deer.
They canned 9,000 quarts that fall.
Ran a depot out of the church basement. Rule: take what you need, leave what
you can. Nobody in the county went hungry in winter ’43. City folks from
Wichita drove 60 miles with empty jars.
The War Department sent a man to
film them. He said “smile.” Hilda said: “We smile when the cellar’s full.” She
was holding a plow, not a flag.
They kept it up till 1945. Last jar
was dated August 14 — V-J Day. Hilda wrote on it: “We won too.”
