"Feed a Fighter" Program to Win War, 1944

“Carolina Farm Comment” by F.H. Jeter, Extension Editor, N.C. State College, Raleigh, as published in the Wilmington Star, March 6, 1944

The battle of Stalingrad stands as one of the great, critical battles of history. It will rank perhaps along with Gettysburg or Waterloo or Kings Mountain or one of those other desperate struggles on which hinged the fate of nations and people. A Russian general who fought at Stalingrad was in the United States recently and he made some interesting observations about the battle. Among them, he said that the Germans in their desperate retreat abandoned huge stores of munitions of all kinds. They left behind great fields of tanks and trucks and enormous supplies of oil and equipment—but they never abandoned food.

This general observed with great clarity the decision of those ruthless leaders who have built one of the greatest fighting machines the world has ever seen. He had seen one of the greatest demonstrations in all history of the force and value of arms and yet he noted that the Germans were ready to abandon everything but food. Not only did they take their own food supplies with them but, as usual, they ravaged the countryside of its entire food supply that those left free from their slavery might suffer from malnutrition.

That’s the German way. They learned from World War I about food because that war left its mark on the young Prussians who were needed by the generals for another war. The Germans regard food as a weapon of war. They withhold it to have their commands obeyed and they supply it to reward their quislings. For the use of their own people they steal every ounce that the conquered countries can produce above a starvation level. Waste of food is not forgiven. Therefore, I was greatly interested in some remarks made by Marvin Jones, federal food administrator, the other day in telling about a dinner party in a mid-west state. There were 81 persons at the tables and when they had scraped all the edible food form the different plates and weighed it, it added up to exactly 17 pounds wasted by the 81 persons at that one dinner. That was abandoned food, Judge Jones said.

“We have always abandoned some food in America,” he added. “Historically, we have been so blessed among the peoples of the earth with such an abundance of food that we have naturally become somewhat careless and wasteful. We have collected figures recently throughout the nation and have found that we have been actually wasting at least 20 percent of all the food produced in this country.”

If Judge Jones is correct, as we must presume that he is, then we waste one pound of food out of every five that we produce. This is said to be enough to feed the combined populations of Greece, Czechoslovakia, Norway and Belgium. At the various colleges where young men are being trained for the various branches of the armed forces, the Experiment Stations have been making a study of food waste and nutrition. So far, these studies indicate in 37 colleges where the studies have been made that from one-half to two-thirds of a pound of food per student per day is being wasted. No wonder the 4-H Club leaders of America are calling upon the young farm people to produce more food. L.R. Harrill, club leader in North Carolina, has figured out that more than 24 million meals a day are needed to feed the men in armed forces. He says that every farm boy and girl of club age, from 10 to 20, should join in the 4-H Club plan of feeding a fighter this year.

It should be kept in mind that a large portion of the men in the army came from the farms. They have been accustomed to eating rather full meals and they gripe when they do not get the kind of food they want. Now that so many of them have gone from the farm, the boys and girls of club age are about all that are left to handle this job of food production. The week of March 4 to 12 has been set aside as club mobilization week and during that period Mr. Harrill is asking that every one stress the importance of the young people joining in 4-H Club work so that they might go about this job of food production in a methodical and definite way. 

One of the principal projects of the work this year will be “Feed a Fighter.” Hundreds of young people enlisted in this project last year and turned in splendid jobs of production. They were rewarded with free trips to nearby army posts and installations that they might see how the soldiers are fed and trained. The army was delighted to have these guests because our soldiers, like those of Germany and Russia, know also that food is a weapon of war.

Food production is going to be a hard job in North Carolina in 1944. Few general farms can … the 16 units demanded by the officials in charge of selective service. If then, additional men are taken from the farms, this will cut more deeply into the available supply of men left to grow food. The young 4-H club members will therefore face a greater responsibility than ever. Last year 92,000 of them did a great job. This year, there should be over 150,000 enlisted in the “Feed a Fighter” program. Here are some of the units of production which have been set up as being necessary to feed a soldier for one year: 1,300 pounds of meat produced by 2 baby beef animals, 6 pigs or 16 lambs, 300 broilers to weigh 1 ½ pounds each, 50 hens that will produce 450 dozen eggs, feed and care for one cow that will provide 5,500 pounds of milk, grow 113 bushels of corn or 110 bushels of tomatoes or 135 bushels of Iris potatoes, and produce 270 gallons of syrup, grow one acre of mixed vegetable, and can 500 quarts of vegetables. Those who do one or more of these things on each farm in the state may not see their food being sent directly oversees to the boy fighting on the battlefront, but, at least, this food when produced on ever farm will release other food to be sent from the great central markets of the nation. At the same time, we shall continue to have food and to spare here at home.