Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1888-01-20
THE FARMERS INSTITUTE.
4 Great MANY People in Attendance
and a Lively Interest Manifested.
Very Interesting and Able Speeches and
Essays.
Yarm and very Profitable Discussion
TUESDAY AFTERNOON.

the city hall on Tuesday afternoon
The meeting was called to order by
| Hon. H. c. Adams. who acted as pres
ident, and
MAYOR NJ. NJ. COTIIREN
delivered the following address OF
welcome in his well known pleasant
| though impressive manner:
| GENTLEMEN OF THE FARMERS IN
STITUTE:-In behalf of the citizens OF
| Mineral Point, / tender you glad
welcome and offer you the warmest
sympathies of city mainly dependent
upon the interests which you represent
for sustenance, prosperity and perma-
hence. Combining the interests OF edu-
cation and agriculture there is nothing
within the range of intellectual thought
that challenges higher respect than the
prOfessed objects Of your association.
Your usefulness and permanence
depend upon the manner III which you
conduct your organization. lgno-
ring the partyism of politics, acting
upon the philosophy of professed Chris
tlanity while laying aside its eccleslas-
teal dogmas. and seeking to develop the
truths of political economy and unfold
the hidden mysteries of nature with sci
entitic research, and practical demon
StratiOn presents a motive too lofty to
escape the admiration of the thought
full and earnest. 1t is time that the
agriculturist should awake to the great
underlying interests of the whole
world. The vast strides made in
other respects towards higher con-
dition OF things within the last few
years it is almost impossible to emu
merate. Medicine, surgery, engineer
ing, chemistry, mechanical inventions,
explorations, geology, dentistry, steam
power. telegraph and its sister rival tel
ephOne, go to swell the list of wonders
that fifty years ago would have been
looked upon as miracles. In the
meantime nature has spoken in no
hidden or muhied tones of its readiness
to anticipate mans wants by opening
its ever creating bosom and flooding the
world with the lights of its petroleum,
and the golden circulating medium of
its California, Australian and noun
tain range mines.
Books have run ahead of increasing
population and an education for the
masses provided in all Christian coun-
tries
But in the broadest field Of advance
ment improvement stands still, com
paratively.
While we have the cotton gin, the
threshing machine and Irvine binder to
utilize the productions Of the soil and
render their accessibility, less IaboriouS,
there is no greater knowledge Of the
earth'S capacity to generate through
mems agency new varieties of food
products now than existed one humid
red years ago. Neither has the knoWl-
edge of how to produce the greatest
amount Of known products increased.
Indeed the English farmer who one hun
dred years ago cultivated by hand his
field Of wheat and raised one hundred
bushels to the acre had truer method
of applying knowledge than we are
willing to initiate. If the American
farmer who raises ten bushels Of wheat
to the acre and plants ten acres would
SOW in drills and hand cultivate, hoe
every row and raise 1000 bushels in
stead of a hundred he would have an
increase Of 800 bushels to pay for the
labor of tending ten acres of ground.
If with mercantile fertilizers he can
raise 500 bushels of potatoes to the
acre instead of one hundred he has
margin of four hundred bushels with
which to fertilize his land from year to
year.
But it is not any more the manner
Of producing from the soil its highest
results of long known families that is
to be the highest glory and achieve
ment of the human intellect than in
finding out the capacity of the ground
to produce new and unknown varieties
of human food. One thousand years
of peace upon earth at the present rate
of increasing population would people
every square mile of earth upon the
globe. The animal for food purposes
must in that case give place TO more
economical and nutritious substances
And as sure as we have the steam
power and illuminating gas and elec-
tricity will we have from earth, air,
electricity and water a fluid to light
and warm and heat and cook. Air
grown substances suitable for food
must be discovered. Substances that
will luXuriate on the most barren soil
of the plains as well as on the blacklist
tops OF the mountains. This broad
| field of inquiry and of grand and glo-
rlous usefulness is now open to the
| farmer.
The educated, experimental farmer
IS the agency through which the Divine
Providence must bring to fruition the
greatest human elevation for this life
through the development and unfold
ing of natures deepest and divinest
mysteries. AS mans body is composed
of every principle found in nature, so
must mans intellectual find out how
to produce the substances. that through
the processes of nutrition and diges-
| ton support the mechanical structure
Of the body, that in its mechanism is
| above all mechanical arts, all architect
ure and all science.
The education of the farmer should
be scientific and practical rather than
classical. He does not need that the
best part of his life should be devoted
to Greek in order that he may dwell
upon the historical inventions of Hero
dotus treating ofrivers dried up in day,
Of provinces famiShed in a moment. of
a passage for ships hewp through the
mountain, of road for armies spread
upon the sea, and of monarchs and
commonwealth swept away to crafty
the lusts and capriceS of tyrantS, be
cause these things can only fill the i'm
agination with things remote from
practical life and opposed to practical
usefulness. He does not need a
knowledge of the Greek, to learn that
Thucydides placed great speeches in
the mouths of his characters; because
he can read in his own language
speeches made in modern times far
greater. although made by men who
made no pretense to classical learning
ThucydideS never invented speech
that in elegance of diction. in grandeur
of thought and in lofty patriotism
equalled the speeches of our OWL
Patrick Henry.
The histories of modern times arr
full of useful lessons that pertain t
the practical life of citizens charged