indicator of moral integrity as well as of social and gender norms - lawn care has long been associated with men. These lawns also reinforce class and societal norms by subtly excluding those who may not have been able to afford a house with a lawn. The lawn as a reflection of someone's character and the neighborhood at large is not restricted to films; the same theme appears in The Great Gatsby (1925), by American novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald. Character Nick Carraway rents the house next to Gatsby's and fails to maintain his lawn according to West Egg standards. The rift between the two lawns troubles Gatsby to the point that he dispatches his gardener to mow Nick's grass and thereby establish uniformity. Most lawn-care equipment over the decades has been advertised to men, and companies have long associated good lawn-care with good citizenship in their marketing campaigns. As well, the appearance of a healthy lawn was meant to imply the health of the man taking care of it; controlled weeds and strict boundaries became a practical application of the desire to control nature, as well as an expression of control over personal lives once working full-time became central to suburban success. Women were encultured over time to view the lawn as part of the household, as an essential furnishing, and to encourage their husbands to maintain a lawn for the family and community reputation. During World War II (1939-1945), women became the focus of lawn-care companies in the absence of their husbands and sons. These companies promoted lawn care as a necessary means by which women could help support their male family-members and American patriotism as a whole. The image of the lawn changed from focusing on technology and manhood to emphasizing aesthetic pleasure and the health benefits derived from its maintenance; advertisers at lawn care companies assumed that women would not respond positively to images of efficiency and power. The language of these marketing campaigns still intended to imbue the female population with notions of family, motherhood, and the duties of a wife; it has been argued that this was done so that it would be easier for men returning from war to resume the roles which their wives had taken over in their absence. This was especially apparent in the 1950s and 1960s, when lawn-care rhetoric emphasized the lawn as a husband's responsibility and as a pleasurable