461-Tiny Gardens Everywhere: The Hidden History of Urban Food Growing
3/19/20261 hr
Tiny gardens in urban settings are far from a novelty — they have an important and influential place in history. There was a time when urban gardens were essential for food security, and they anchored communities. To discuss what we can learn from the history of urban gardens and how these lessons apply to gardeners today, environmental historian Kate Brown joins me this week.
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Showing 10 of 13Transcript preview
First 90 secondsJoe Lamp'l· Host0:00
Hi everybody. I'm Joe Lamp'l, the Joe behind Joe Gardener, and welcome to The Joe Gardener Show. Today's guest is Kate Brown, author of Tiny Gardens Everywhere: The Past, Present, and Future of the Self-Provisioning City. Kate is an environmental historian and professor at MIT whose work explores the relationship between people, place, and the systems that sustain us. In this book, she takes us back to a time when cities weren't just places of consumption, but places of production, where everyday people grew food in backyards, vacant lots, and shared spaces, not as a hobby, but as a necessity. And what makes this so relevant today is what it suggests for the future, that even the smallest spaces multiplied across communities can become powerful engines of resilience. Today, we're talking about what we can learn from that and how it applies to gardeners right now. So let's get into it, and as we do, thanks to our sponsors for today's episode, Soil Cubed and Milorganite. You probably know by now, having access to high-quality compost is my not-so-secret weapon for the success of everything I grow in my garden, and that's why I'm so proud to be partnering with Soil Cubed. If you live in their delivery zones within Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, most of Alabama, and for some of my Texas listeners, Soil Cubed is now in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, so this message is for you. Soil Cubed compost is OMRI