The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1875-02-25
TWO GIRLS WHO TRIED FARMING,

TWO GIRLS WHO TRIED FARMING.
A magazine tells us in rather pic
turesque, gossipy way of the successful
experience of "Two Girls that Tried
Farming. The case, as it is put by the
first plaintiff-who is the chonicler-is
"Dorothea " Alice Shepherd and Louise
Barney agt. Fate" The first was
school teacher, and the other hired
girl. They had long been fast friends.
and firing of their lonely life, and of
merely serving others, they resolved,
after much dreaming and planning, to
help themselves to independence. To
use their own words: "We wanted a
home, we wanted to be our own mis-.
tresses, we wanted a living that should
be independent of the likes, dislikes and
caprices of others" And the opportune
moment came. A maiden sister of
Louise, who had saved $500 as house
keeper, died and left her this money. So
one day, soon after, she said, "Lct us go
WestW
cit was a startling thought to me-"
says Dorothea-''a girl who never had
planted hill of corn, or hoed a row of
potatoes in her life, and who had Il
hacking cough and a pain in her side"
stu, she wanted the outdoor air and
freedom; and having first examined
nearly all the implements to be used on
farm, and thinking them "as manage
able by feminine muscles as the heavy
Kettles, washing machines, mattresses
anu carpets that belong to woman's in
door work, J." she resolved to go. The
two went to Michigan, and, with the
school teachers three hundred, their
capital on arriving was about thousand
dollars-not very large sum with which
to buy and equip farm. A cousin,
resident there, took them around view
ing, and they found, and at once pur-
chased thlrty-five acres, without quite
using their whole means. Gas q whole
1t was narrow, billy stretchy outlined
by weak skeleton of a fence; forbid
ding surface of old Stubble-ground and
wild turf, the distant hill-tops crowned
with tall mulleins. There was not sprig
OF clover on the place, and, though there
was an old brown house and barn, there
was not an orchard tree, nor reminis-
cence of garden"
Widespread CONSERVATION on the part
of the neighbors occurred over this
choice; and Cousin John, who stood on
the tower of experience, looked down
theretrom with rather malicious purport,
and dlscoursed at wearisome length of
the poor soil. "He warned u.s." SAYS
DOrOthea, "that we could never expect
to raise wheat" But DOrothea had seen
nothing but wheat III the State, and
didn't believe i'll it, on account of few
principles OF chemistry, and let the ex-
pert laugh at her "schoolma'am farm
ing" Before taking possession of their
farm the two girls prepare themselves
to DO so by earning little more money,
and by accommodating some practical ex-
perlence. Dorothea, therefore, hires out
to John for outdoor work at $12
month, and Louise to farmer near by
for houseworl at 81 week. The former
equlps herself in short dresses, and finds
everything hard at first, but nothing i'm
possible. With small boy she cuts up
half dozen acres of corn, husks the
same, and binds the bundles. 1t tore
her hands, and then when she carried
the bundles to set them up they would
often fall in pieces. Espying two Ger
man women working in cornsnear by
she accosts them, and gets hint: $50
puy youself some pals of leetle rope,
and not tear you shmall hands wit twist
ing stalks and marsh hay. It do take
more time to twist him than it do to
earn de leetle rope"
Outdoor work and oatmeal give the
schoolmlstress an appetite, cure her
cough, and strengthen her muscles. She
learns the mans way of holding a plow
and turning furrow, and she and the
young boy plow out the potatoes, in the
potato harvest. She learns how to make
corn-stack, and how to lay load. She
picks apples, drives the mower to cut the
seed clover, harnesses, milks, feeds and
cares for stock, swings an AK, and files
saw She questions, and compares her
answers with what she reads in the agri-
cultural papers. AT length she gets
Cousin John to go over with his team to
her farm. He plows every in ch of it ex-
cept the door-yard and wood-lot; but
protests against the nonsense of "fall
plowing," He protests still more be-
cause Dorothea bargains for every load
OF barnyard compost which the farmers
for ten miles around would sell and de-
liver. A friendly neighbor laughs at
Miss Shepherd, who's "agoin' to work
her farm with idees."
After winter of school ol-teaching on
Dorothea's part, and further sewing
work by Louise, the two begin with
their farm in the spring, having earned
enough to put on a horse and a COW,
hens, pigs, implements, grass and clover
seed, etc. Furniture is improvised for
the house; scalloped newspapers made
the window-curtains; little stand, with
leaf added, made table, and SO on.
Yet there were few books and unbound
magazines, and picture or two. John
copes over and gang-plows fields de-
voted to clover, and the girls
harrow them. They SOW their clover,
timothy, and orchard grass so
thiekly that John almost 'swears
at their wastefulness but Dorothea
doesn't like the spotted meadows she
mas seen" the clover growing in dis
tinct patches and tufts, the grasses
coarse, sparse and wiry." She wanted
soSpe iine, sweet grasses, and the plenti-
frl winter dressing and thick seeding
accomplished her wish. But such ex.