Canning Supplies for England; Enriching NC Farms, 1941

From Carolina Farm Notes by F.H. Jeter, in The Southern Planter, March 1941 issue

Canning Supplies for England

Home Demonstration club women of North Carolina have contributed $106.93 so far to provide food conservation equipment for the country women of England who need to grow and conserve more food than usual and who, in some cases, have had their existing equipment blown to bits by murderous aggressors from Germany. The money donated will be combined with funds from other states and used to buy pressure cookers and other canning equipment.

The Women’s Institute of England, corresponding to the Home Demonstration clubs of America, has been asked to assume the leadership in promoting home conservation of food, and these contributions will help to provide equipment not now available in sufficient amount.

Lespedeza Pays on Mecklenburg County Farm

“Before I began seeding lespedeza on my small grain about 10 years ago, I made 28 to 30 bales of lint cotton a year on 50 acres. But last year I made 37 bales on my allotted 29.4 acres,” says P.C. Harkey, a farmer in the Sharon township of Mecklenburg County.

“Furthermore, my farm is 40 per cent more valuable than it was 10 years ago because the soil is more fertile and the fields less eroded.”

Mr. Harkey said he would not plant 50 acres of cotton now even if he were allotted that many acres for the simple reason that he has learned to make more on fewer acres. Lespedeza has made his soil easier to plow, causes it to hold moisture better and permits the cotton plants to hold squares and bolls to maturity. Corn has benefited to the same extent as cotton.