Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-05-24
DOES FARMING PAY:

"No." answers the man who is endeavor-
NC TO work the farming masses into
frenzy with a view to thereby feather his
own personal nest. 'Yes,' says 4 cor
respondent of the Country Gentleman,
''good farming pays every time. In farm
ing, as in everything else of our present
times, it is simply n survival of the fit
test The correspondent then goes on to
state that some men may make failure,
and many only bare living, but others ac-
quire competence. Some merchants fail,
many make living, few acquire wealth.
Many lawyers fail, some make mere liv-
ing, few become wealthy. So 1t is IN all
the trades and professions.
Education, intelligence, perseverance and
business ability will win every time, and
these are Just as useful and OF just as
much advantage to the farmer as to the
tradesman or professional man.
This correspondent says he recently came
from section of Wisconsin which in his
early Extraordinarily years ago-was
literally ''howling wilderness" To-day
the forests have disappeared; so have the
primitive log houses and stables. In their
places are neatly-painted farmhouses, great
barns and stables, sleek looking cattle and
broad fields of grain over which the farmer
at harvest time drives his fine team and
Irvine binder, and at night looks over an
extent of ten to twelve acres covered with
rich shocks of grain which in the morning
was uncut. Yet he grumbles and says
farming doesn't pay" It is the popular
refrain, and he finds himself in duty bound
to sing the same song being sung by the
majority. His conscience may smite him
little as he does it, but he joins in all the
same. How do the facts sustain him in the
act2 Twenty years ago he was not worth
$780, perhaps not $780, To-day he is worth
$4,000. $4,000, or more, according to his
ability.
So it is with hundreds of farmers the
writer knows. They began life with little
or nothing few years ago. To-day they
have a competence. How much larger per-
centage of merchants, lawyers, doctors or
| manufacturers have done as well2 OF the
hundreds of thousands of prosperous farm
ers all over the country, but small per-
centage commenced with capital enough to
start one-horse corner grocery. Every
one of the broad fields, happy homes, neat
cottages, spacious barns and well kept
herds of our country enter a standing pro-
test against this oft repeated lie-''farming
doesn't pay"
There are fewer individual failures among
farmers than among the people engaged in
any other calling. When did you ever hear
of regular farmer who had made an as
signmenta and turned his property over to
is being done constantly, more or less, by
business men IN almost every town or city2
You may have heard of such thing, but
when? Is it a common occurrence as in the
other casea If not, and yet farming don't
pay, why not2 One has but to go abroad in
the farming regions to get himself convinced
that good farming does pay in the aggre-
gate, just the same as walk along the
business streets of city will convince him
that correctly managed trade pays. 1t is
only an adherence to correct business prin-
ciples, and an employment of correct man
agement, that pays in any case. Who can,
with any show of reason, say this is not the
true way to look at the question.
This senseless wall over failure of farm
ing to pay is hurting the country more than
anything else that could be sprung. 1t
engenders encouragement and prevents the
putting forth Of due effort. 1t retards