The Vegetable Gardens Of Allentown

When Charles M. Ritter passed away in 1964, his obituary headlined that he was a star athlete at Allentown High School when graduating in 1910. He spent most of his working career at Kuhns and Shankweiler, a major men's clothing emporium at 7th and Hamilton. In 1948 he was president of the Kiwanis Club.  During that era,  many men belonged to one service club or another.

He and his wife Anne lived near 12th and Linden, where his row house yard was dominated by a summer vegetable garden.  They had an outside cellar entrance,  basement stove and sink to facilitate canning vegetables.  

Their long, old harvest table shown above probably came from his rural childhood home in Orefield.  By summer's end it was covered with mason jars filled with vegetables, like those grown in hundreds of other backyard gardens across Allentown.