America's Inner City Gardeners
In every metropolitan area of the USA, residents have been planting flowers, vegetables, trees and herbs with astonishing results. The gardeners of these patches of Eden include pensioners, low income and no income people. Their gardens are overflowing dramatic proof of a renewed consciousness of urban ecology. A Patch of Eden celebrates the achievements of inner city gardeners, relating in detail the stories of community gardens in Harlem, Philadelphia, Chicago and San Francisco (where Cathrine Sneed has taught more than 2000 inmates of the San Francisco County Jail to grow flowers and vegetables). The areas where garden projects are thriving have seen dramatic decreases in graffiti, street crime and drug trading.