San Marcos free press. [volume] (San Marcos, Tex.) 1877-1892, 1877-12-22
FARM LIFE.
Reasons Why Our Surplus Labor Should
Seek the Country.


Mr.. O. G. Gibbs, who has recently
made an extended trip through the
Southwest in the interest of the Chicago
Tribune, and has given in series of
letters to that paper the results of his
observations, concludes the series with
the folio wing: e
The main facts developed in my some
what extended Investigations have been:
that there are almost unlimited guam
titles of cheap and fertile lands obtain
able on easy terms by the actual settler,
in range of climate from that of the
Gulf States on the south to Minnesota
on the north, capable of producing all
the great agricultural staples and the
keeping of all kinds of live stock; that
these lands only require occupancy and
cultivation to reward the husbandman
with generous crops, which bring re-
munerative prices to the producer.
While in all our cities and larger towns
and manufacturing districts there are
great distress and suffering consequent
upon lack Of employment, and there are
thousands of honest, well-disposed peo-
pie who will have to be supported by
charity during the winter, throughout
the agricultural districts there is
comfort and plenty. In all the country
have passed over, 1 have met no one
who was troubled to know how he was
going to get through the winter. Not
that all were rich and independent, but
they were living under such conditions
that the essential wants of shelter, food,
and fuel could be supplied by their own
unaided efforts; and I am exceedingly
DESTROYS that those whose condition and
circumstances expose them to the same
provocation and suffering which many
are now experiencing, but who now
have it in their power to take a new de-
parture and place themselves in more
hopeful circumstances for the future,
should do so.
The flush times during and succeed
ing the War; the increased demand for
all kinds of manufactured goods; the
fortunes made in trade and speculation
of all kinds, from corn to corner lots;
the building, equipment, and. running
of thousands of miles of new railroads
and telegraph lines; the rebuilding of
burnt Chicago, and the extension OF
other towns and cities created demand
for labor CT all grades which produced
regular stampede from the country.
FARMING WAS IN DISTRIBUTE,
andy regarded as too slow and old
fogy an occupation for this advanced
age. Its slow and moderate gains cut
no figure beside the profits of I" corner
in wheat" or sales of corner lots. The
young man who had gone to the city and
secured employment in railroad office
or store, and who made occasional visits
home in all the glory of store clothes,
hair-oil, and gold-headed cane, was
the admiration and envy of all his for
mer associates, each Of whom resolved
to emancipate himself from the drudgery
of farm-life at the earliest possible mo-
ment. There was wonderful accession
to the ranks of the learned professions,
and our medical and law schools were
crowded with young men who threw
down the pitchfork and forsook the
pillow for a higher career in life. Even
staid, substantial farmers got their heads
turned and sold their farms, and came
to the city to engage in business and
make a fortune. All went swimmingly
till the panic struck us, when change
came DER the spirit of their
dream. Gradually, but sure
ly, the squeezing process
has been going on, till many schemes
and enterprises that but little while
ago were so rich and promising, have
been literally squeezed dry, and we have
been awakened to the fact that we have
a laboring population of all grades
and include in this all the salaried
classes-twice as large as are needed for .
the work of the present time or likely to
be needed for some years to come. The
result is that large numbers are without
any employment. Others get only &C.
.casional and temporary work, and others
still resort to all kinds of makeshifts to
secure living-going about with some
article to sell or soliciting orders for
grocery-houses, printing-oflices, and
thousand other things too numerous to
mention, while those in regular employ