Victory Garden at Walbrook and Windsor Hills/ Sun File Photo

On June 6, 1944, U.S. military forces were launching the invasion of Normandy, France. It was D-Day.

And Baltimoreans were gardening.

A news story that ran in The Evening Sun on June 7 65 years ago reports that gardeners left their radios and the invasion broadcasts of D-Day to work in their victory gardens.

"There's nothing much an old lady like me can do," said  Mary Cook, of Mosher Street, a 68-year-old entrant in the newspaper's garden contest.

"The garden secretary [of the Women's Civic League] said I was helping the war by raising vegetables, so I worked all day and didn't even notice how hot the sun was. I'm sure it's just as hot over there."

The news story also quotes Robert Morris of Old Frederick Road, who was thought to have the largest individual garden in the city.

"I'm going to plant 100 more tomato plants [he already had 300]. That might not be much direct help, but it is one thing you can do and it's better than nothing. Man, I can hardly wait to get started."

One woman, with two sons in England, told the newspaper she was so distressed when she heard the 'flash' that the invasion had begun that she didn't know what to do.

"My garden is way back of the house," she said. "And it was comforting just to get away from everybody and everything and get down on my knees and dig in the earth.

"It was so quiet and I got a queer kind of satisfaction to think that if I preserved them, the boys would probably one day be eating these very vegetables I was weeding."

And finally, the story quoted an unidentified "Negro woman" who brought three jars of strawberry preserves to the Women's League headquarters.

 "Berries are so expensive this year, I couldn't buy many," she said. "But I did put up six jars. I want to give these three to the soldiers."