Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1880-04-01
Decrease in the Size of Farms


Decrease in the Size of Farms
The attention of the public has been
attracted of late to the large tracts OF
land owned and worked by capitalists
in the Northwestern States, This has
given many the idea that the tendency
Of American farming is in this direc-
ton. Fortunately this is not the fact!
The success Of farming on an immense
scale would indeed increase the number
of such experiments in the newer and
unoccupied States, and this, perhaps,
will be the result. The business stag
nation the last few years which has
kept capitalists from investing in other
enterprises, has naturally turned their
attention to farming. By securing large
tracts Of cheap lands, and keeping
them under the pillow for wheat, a large
apparent profit is made. The first
blowing breaking prairie sod-is e1-
pensive, but after that wheat can be
grown for several years with little ex-
pense except seed and harvesting. All
the work is done by machinery, and
with as small a number of men as pos
sible. Self-binding reapers diminish the
labor of harvesting. Threshing is done
in the field, and the straw is burned on
the ground to get it out of the way.
OF course, the soil is rapidly exhausted,
but the owners have taken the cream of
fertility and made it pay for the land
two or three or more times before they
throw it aside as worthless.
As far as maintaining fertility is con-
cerned, this policy is the one always
adopted in new countries. Heretofore,
with occasional exceptions, the newer
States have been occupied by actual
settlers, who come to build homes and
become permanent residents of the
commonwealth. To be sure, for time
they unduly exhaust the fertility of their
lands; but when the farm is compare
lively small this process is always
stopped sooner than when the farms are
unduly large. The small farmer is
compelled to maintain a higher state of
fertility because he has fewer acres
from which to defray family and Incl
dental expenses. With large farm a
small profit per acre will maintain its
owner in affluence; but on small farm
the utmost must be made from every
acre.
It is therefore for the public interest
in more ways than one that the
tendency to monopolize large tracts Of
land in few hands should be
discouraged. The more small farm
ers there are in the country the
greater number of independent free
holders, who are the best securi-
ty for the perpetuity of popular
liberties. Large farmers require an in
creased number of dependents, who
can not have the same interest in the
future of the country as the owners of
the soil. 1t is true that other circum-
stances modify this rule somewhat.
The large numbers of labor-saving inn
plements invented in the last thirty
years enable one man to work a larger
area of land than formerly. Without
mowers and reapers the crops of the
Northwest could not be harvested with
the present force of laborers. Yet tax
ing the country through the census re
ports show that during thirty years the
size of farms has greatly decreased, and
this, despite the fact that within thirty
years the new States have been occu-
pied with railroads which have massed
large tracts in few hands. The figures
from 1850 to 1870 are as follows:
Year. Acres.
1850. Average size of FARMS .................203
1860. Average size of farms. .199
1870. Average size of farms. .153
1t is probable that the census next
summer will show that this tendency
continues, as is natural where land is
cheap, as it is in this country, and every
man who chooses can secure a home of
his own with few years. labor. There
are no difficulties interposed in any
State to discourage or prevent the SUBJ
division of farms as in England and Ire
ltuus tuu Vic CNu WUlCl GlC PcOPlc
are suffering from landlordism are in
little danger of appearing in this coun-
try. Even in the newer States where
large, unoccupied areas tempt capital
lists to buy and hold immense tracts, the
tendency is the same. In Texas, for
example, the average size CT farms in
1850 was 942 acres. In 1860 it had de-
creased to sol acres, and in 1870 to 3Ol
acres. No other State has so large
farms as Texas. Nevada in 1860
had farms of Gil acres; but in 1870
they had decreased to POI acres. In
Illinois, Indiana and Iowa, in 1870 the
average size of farms was 1913, 1l2 and
1874 acres respectively. These are much
smaller farms than we of the East i'm
agine to be the average in those States.
Probably, however, this average is large
ly reduced by the increased numbers OF
holders of real estate for market garden