Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1878-03-09
New England +. rming.

For a generation ard longer, perhaps, II has
been common and popular to deprec'ate farming
in Massachusetts, and over New England as COM
pa ed with the Middle and Western States. Ever
since that phrase, coined by late distinguished
iournslist. go West" was heard as it has been
over the Eastern States there has been mani
fest purpose among the rural population of New
Eneland-farmers aud farmers sons-to leave
the r old homes and go West" This has served
to create disaste for, aud dis ike to, New En-
gland farming, And now, what is the sequel to
this depreciation of farming in the East and the
exalting of farming in the West Deserted farms,
loss of population, depreciation in value OF farms
and farming lands, etc, are the common themes
of journalists lecturers and farmers meetings
One can hardly take up agricultural journal or
other paper whether published in the city or
the country, that has not an article with
the following head, copied from New Hamp-
shire city paper, Deserted Farms" or with SINH
lar ones.
Did all who hasten to obey the cry of $50
West" duly consider the matter, and had they
done so, would they have left good homes in New
England with the uncertainty Of obtaining as
good ones in he West 1t is not imProbably true
to-day, that many who left the East with the hope
and expectation of lettering their condition by
going West, failed to do so, nd have enjoyed few
er of the good things of this life, physically, NOR
ally and socially, than they could had they re-
NAMED on their Easter fsa ms which they left to
go West.
Western man inquired of by many Eastern
parties about going West, wrote lately to a jour
nal published in this city followss eff married,
and YOU have little farm in New England or
New York State, word IN your ear-don't go /! IL
you will be content to live half as frugally where
you are, as you will be obliged to do in the West
you will find there is money TO he made in fal m
ing in the old States yet. A man stand pri-
walton, for his business briggs him in contact with
his fellows; but for a woman bred in New En-
gland, with neighbors few steps away, II is very
hard. Home duties coHfue her TO the farm, with
neal neig hbOr TO run in and chat, the nearest
house being half a mile or mile away. No
wonder is il that womer, planted to the West,
pine fade and die. This is the terrible isolation
of American isrm-iie, a thing that does not
1T in the States bordering on the Atlantic sea
board"
Here is the statement quoted from man who
writes of farm-ife in Minnesota, State, socially,
like the other new States where land is cheap,
nominally-ienceless aud houseless.-set all round
with privations and faculties too numerous to
mention-some of which are more than limited at
by the quotation from the Western mao as cited
above. Let all who are contemplating the expe-
deDcy of going West from Eastern homes consd-
er well before they decide to go.
1t vas proclaimed a few years ago that farmers
could buy Western corn and pay the freight by
rail from Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin cheaper
than they could raise il in Massachusetts and New
Hampshire, and the farmers believed il, demon
slrated by what the president of the Board of
Agriculture IN the latter state said at agiicul
tural field meeting IN Massachusetts in the Sum-
mer of 1877, that "New Hampshire had paid out
VI, 500, 600 year for corn" Had the Granite
State continued to grow corn, and to grow corn TO
sell as she did in generations gone by, when her
rural population was much greater than now, her
journalists would not, as now. be disconrsing Of
deserted farms" and decrease of population.
Facts relative o farming in the East and the
West could they all be collated IN respect to small
farms and families thereon, would determine farm
ers with but few humid ed dollars to favor East
efn homes IS compared with Western, there is lit
tie reason to doubt
A farmer in West Spring field lately stated that
corn IN Illinois a, the crib was worth only 10 cents
bushel In Massachusetts, rs or 80 cents BUSH
ell II was remarked by another gentleman that
the average number of bushels grown per acre in
the two States, according to the United States
Census returns, WAS about the same. There are
farms in New England where corn can be grown
at no greater cost per bushel than in Illinois, or
the West, generally. Let these facts and sugges-
tons be duly considered with others that will &C.
cur to every mind, and New England farming will
soon cast of the odIum resting upon it for quar-
tel of century-Boston 7rauelier.