The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1895-12-04
AGRICULTURAL.
The Newspapers and the Farm
ers' Club.

Farmers clubs are very excellent
things; they are great helps to those
who attend them, and especially to
those who take part in their discus.
sions. But there seem to be very few
of them here in Vermont. Where the
farmers come together they prefer to
form Grange meeting, and thus not
only secure many of the advantages of
the old time farmers club, but also the
additional ones which the social organ.
ization of the Grange confers. But
meanwhile, what of the farmers who
live outside of the beneficent influence
of the Patrons of Husbandryp We be-
lieve that the agricultural columns of
the state papers can best meet the To-
cal needs of the farmers. In saying
this we do not mean in the least to dis
parage the work of the many excellent
agricultural papers. We believe that
every farmer ought to take at least one
good agricultural paper. But there are
far too many farmers who do not read
any agricultural paper, while there is
hardly one to be found who does not
take at least one state paper. And
these are just the men to be helped by
a strong agricultural department in
their weekly paper. In the long even
ings they have time to read, and how
ever much they may be prejudiced
against book or newspaper farming
they can hardly help reading we'll
written articles on subjects in which
they are deeply interested.
The farmers columns will be the best
and most practical when the matter that
is printed in them is written by farm
ers; when, in fact, the farmers COL
umns become a real farmers club;
when man who has found out some
valuable fact in farm experience sits
down with his pen and tells the hun
dreds who read the paper what he had
learned. This is the makeup of the
ideal farmers corner of the newspa-
per. If A has tried crimson clover
and had poor success or good sue
cess with it, he can help many of his
fellows by giving his experience
perhaps save some of them many
times the cost of the paper for a year,
If the farmer who takes the paper to
get the news can also get practical in
formation which is worth many dollars
to him he will be dou Die gamer. And
he in turn may, by few minutes
writing, be able to help others. Even
in so small a state as Vermont there are
great differences in soil and climate,
but the differences must be far less
than those of New England, and the
differences of soil and climate in New
England are far less than those of
other parts of the country. Vermont
farmers can, on many subjects, write
for Vermont farmers better than the
farmers of other, and especially of dis
tant, states can write for them. 1t is
often stumbling block in the way of
men who are not enthusiastic readers
of the agricultural papers that things
are written by men who are very diff
ferently situated as to soil, etc., from
themselves, and on this account any at
tempt to carry out their advice would
be followed by disaster. Advice or ex-
perience good for one section or state
may be wholly inappropriate for an
other, hence the value of articles writ
ten by those living near by. One man
may want to learn about a crop, may
want to ask questions on some topic
which no one whom he meets in his own
neighborhood or towl can answer. If
he can write out his questions and send
them to the paper, they may meet the
eye of some one who can give Just the
information he seeks. Or one may tell
some of his mistakes and failures, or
his successes, and thus warn or encour-
age others. The newspaper lends it.
self to such work, because it goes to all
parts of the territory which it is pub
lished for. 1t costs but little, can be
taken up and read at odd times, can
bear information from one person to
another; can take a farmers letter,
multiply it hundreds and thousands of
times, and send it to thousands of ia.
terested readers. 1t is easy to see what
a help the newspaper may be made to
those who, by the very nature of their
occupation, are more or less isolated and
thus cut off from communication with
their fellow workers. And, in the
ways we have suggested, many of the
disadvantages of this isolation may be
overcome. j. w. NEWTON.