The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1882-08-10
Tha Mistakes E,rmars Maka.


An exchange, published in the in
terror of the states, speaks of the
departure of an old settler for Dako
ia, where he will take up quarter
section of land and start in life
again at the age OF seventy. The
case of the man is SO near that of
thousands of others, that a few
comments may not be out of place.
The man had a nice farm near a
splendid town, where he had lived
and brought up family. He got
tired of farming, sold the farm for
six thousand dollars, moved to
town and went into the livery bust
ness, and in three years went
through everything except a team
and a lumber wagon, and now he
has packed up and gone to Dakota,
with a heart heavier than his peck
et-book and he will die out there.
The number of farmers that decide
to 90 to town to live, every year,
and 90 into business, is appalling.
Every town has them, and nine out
of ten become poor. They get an
idea that town business men are the
happiest people on earth, and have
an easy time, and they get to brood
ing over their hard life, and they
think anybody can run a store, a
grocery, or a livery stable, and they
sell out the farm and 60 into bust
ness in town. The most Of them
90 into the grocery business, be-
cause it seems so easy to weigh out
sugar and tea. They can always
find a grocery man who will sell out
the remains of sick stock of gro
ceries for ready cash, and when the
farmer first sees his name over the
door of a grocery, he feels as
though he was made, and puts his
thumbs in the arm-holes ofhis vest.
He uses his money to stock up, pays
cash, and his credit is good, and he
buys everything that is shown him.
The commercial traveller who first
strikes the farmer grocer has it all
his own way, and pretty soon the
grocery is full. 1t generally takes
farmer two years to go through a
200 acre farm in the grocery bust
ness. Instead of the business be-
ing an easy, running sort of lay
out, it requires the best manage
ment of any branch of trade. The
profits are small, and the waste is
terrible. A grocer has got to be
sharp as tackG. The farmers girls
and BOYS soon realize that they are
merchants sons and daughters, in
stead of farmers, and they have to
keep up with the procession. There
has to be lots of things bought as
merchants that would never be
thought of as farmers. The farm
house furniture is not good enough,
the democrat wagon gives place to
carriage, the old mare gives place
to high steppers, and the girls
dress better, and do not work. The
family lives outI of the grocery, the
boys play base ball, and the girls
90 to big parties. The farmer is a
good fellow and trusts many other
good fellows who can't pay, and in
some cases he gets to drinking.
Bills begin to come in, and he can t
collect enough to pay rent. Friends
that would help him out with money
when he had a farm, will now tell
him money is mighty scarce, and
he will have to give chattel mort
gage on the stock. The stock runs
down until there's nothing but a
red tin-can of mustard, with bulls
head on it, some canned peaches
and cove oysters on the shelves, a
few boxes of wooden clothespiRs,
six wagon loads of barrels with a
little sugar in the bottom, a couple
of dozen wash-boards, box of cod
fish of the vintage of 1860, which
smells like a glue factory, show
case full of three-cent wooden pocket
combs and blueing, hairpins and
shaving soap, some empty cigar
boxes that the boys have smoked
the cigars out of, and few such
things that do not bring enough at
an auction to pay for printing the
auction bills. Then the farmer
breaks up and goes west, leaving a
lot of bills in the hands of a lawyer
for collection, who manages to col
lect enough to pay his commission,
and the family that was SO happy
on the farm, and so independent,
becomes demoralized, the girls mar
ry chambermaids in livery stables
rather than go west, the boys go to
driving hacks or working on a
threshing machine, or tending bar,
and refuse to go west, and the old
folks 90 to Dakota alone, and wish
they were dead, and will be quick
enough. This is the history OF
thousands of farmers who get tired
of the old farm. If they would
but realize that they are better
fixed than nine-tenths of the mer
chants in towns, and that they can
not become successful merchants
any more than merchants can be-
come successful farmers, they