Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1889-02-20
The FARMERS INSTITUTE
An Interesting Meeting at Milan
Yesterday.
Tae County Government ana its Diff
ferent Nodes Tborou .hiy Discussed
The American Horse. -Other sub
JecfN.

f.rent Nodes TbOrOu shiy Discussed
The American Horse ..Other sub
Jeets.
The Rock Island County Farmers In
stitute had an exceedingly interesting
and well attended meeting at Milan yes
terday, President Campbell presided.
The morning session was opened with
prayer by Rev. Kerr, and the first paper
called up was that of Mr.. 8. L. Swisher,
of Coe. ON The County Organic alton. I"
Mr.. Swisher was emphatically in favor
of the maintenance OF tho present sys>
TEN of supervisors. He held that the
commissioner system had tendency to
Capitalization. and that under 1t the in
terests of the county were too apt to be
concentrated In one particular locality,
welding the greatest lrduence. The
township Organization, MI. 81 Usher held.
was founded upon the pr nciple of local
self government. the FIRST position taken
by the founders of the republic. With
such system all interests were rep
resented, and all interests had a
voice and were protected and provided
for. He claimed too, that as matter of
fact, the supervisor system was more ex-
pensive than the commissioner system
Last year the cost Of running the board
was 81 900; with comm issioner system
one good man could no. be secured for
less than $500 and with three the salary
item alone would be sa.400. With a
| commissioners system remote localities
would not be properly represented. Say
there are three commissioners; Rock Isl.
and would have TO have one. Moline one,
and the other would have to go either to
the upper or the lower end of the county.
In this connection Mr.. Swisher referred
to the proposition to have the county as
sumo the Milan bridges. he did not think
| the county should, but VI der the commits,
sioner system they might be shouldered
of on the county anyway. All parts of
the county could not be represented In a
commissioner system. I'm less the number
| of commissioners was increased to five
! and this could not be done without ln>
creasipg the expense. MIR. Swisher's
paper was discussed by all present, all
sustaining Mr.. Swishers views except
one. who upheld the commissioner plan
| on the ground that 1t provided for a
smaller body which might more easily
and with less friction discharge Its duties
and thus save time and expense. The
sentiments of the meeting favored the
present supervisor plan.
The first subject that came up at the
afternoon session was Mr. Arthur Bur
rails paper on the "NaIionsl Horse OF
America. MIR. Burial had prepared an
excellent article on the very interesting
topic and handled 1t In a thoroughly able
manner. He first defined what he meant
by the American horse. Il is not, he
said, the heavy draught horse which are
progeny of the ClydssdHle and Norman
stock, which are OF mole recent origin
The distinctly American horse ia really
the progeny of the imported horse, Mes
senger, which. through development had
given to the race peculiar traits, the
principal of which are trotting speed
endurance and general easy freedom OF
action. Mr.. BurralPs iiea vas that for
general all-around purposes, for farmers
use, for ordinary WORK, the American
horse Of good form and weighing from
LOO 10 1900 pounds was superior to the
immense horses which are being bred now
for the market, and weighing from 900
| 10 ! 300 pounds, while the latter might
be desirable probably for heavy work.
He said the prevailing notion that STAN
dard bred horse was Of spe cial use only
upon the turf WAS mistaken one; it was
| only by severe turf tests that the peculiar
e1cellencies and persistence of q strain or
breed was demonstrated. and that while
an occasional one might develop two
and oue-half minute gait, the real value
consisted in the excellence. produced in
The great number that were not SO fast,
but still possessed the traits of the strain
10 such an extent as TO be superior for all
around work to the heavy horses, or to
those small horses In which no care had
been taken to perpetrats or develop any
one or more desirable q ualities. He gave
statistics Of the money value OF the
horses Of the United States, of the mum.
Der and value in several individual states,
and showed that Illinois owned one thir-
| teenth of the horses In the United States
He also gave statistics Of several sales OF
standard bred trottipg horses In which the
average price ranged up into several
hundreds of dollars. After reading the
paper he answered questions for fully IF.
teen minutes, and ther followed an ami
mated discussion. FROM which spectator
might have thought the Norman horse Iu-
terest at one time entirely pervaded the
institute, while at another that the genera
sentiment was that the Norman and
Clydesdsle were bred very much as
thoroughbred csttle--for the amount OF
beef into which they might be converted.
w. 8. McCulloch read fine paper or
''Miscellaaso1s Farming" followed by