Michelle Obama Plants Organic Vege Garden in White House
The New York Times reports that "on Friday, Michelle Obama will begin digging up a patch of White House lawn to plant a vegetable garden, the first since Eleanor Roosevelt's Victory Garden in World War II."

Produce from the organic garden will be used for the first family's meals and formal dinners, but Ms. Obama says the most important role of the 1,100 square foot plot will be the education of children about healthful, locally-grown fruits and vegetables: "My hope is that through children, they will begin to educate their families and that will, in turn, begin to educate our communities."

The garden will feature 55 varieties of vegetables grown from organic seedlings in White House greenhouses, cultivated in raised-bed plots fertilized with White House compost, crab meal from the Chesapeake Bay, lime and green sand.

A grassroots campaign for such a garden, sparked by Michael Pollan's October 2008 New York Times column ("Farmer In Chief"), gained steam after November's election. http://www.panna.org/resources/panups/panup_20090319