Industrial freedom. [volume] (Edison, Wash.) 1898-1???, 1898-12-03

II N l. w
1A speaking relatively and in
y round numbers, two million
IL men gave up farming and
went to join the great army
of toilers in our cities. Taking their
families into account, six million peo-
pie from the farm were added to the
population of the town; or, to put it
in another way, in 1870, according to
Carroll D. Wright, 1912 per cent. of
all the persons engaged in gainful oc-
equations were employed in farming.
In 1890 only 36.44 per cent were SO
employed The farms lost ten per
cent in these twenty years. The same
causes which produced that great
movement of population to the towns
are still operative. The rush to the
cities continues, and will continue.
Nor is this movement confined to this
country. The same thing has taken
place in Europe. Such cities as Berlin
and Budapest have grown in recent
years almost as rapidly as Chicago or
Buffalo.
For this tendency to leave the farm
and seek his fortune in the town, it is
common to lay great blame on the
shoulders of the farmers boy. He is
popularity supposed to be an uncOm-
monty restless person who, weary OF
the dull routine in which he has been
reared, and attracted by the glare and
excitement of city streets and pleas
ures, leaves the plough in the furrow.
anil without so much as casting one
look backward in regret for separa-
ton from old friends and associations
hastens to mingle in the strife and
turmoil of the town. BY many he is
sneered at as very foolish boy who
comes to town in total ignorance of
the hard conditions of the average
city worker, thinking to leap with a
few bounds into fame and fortune.
Thrilling tales are often told of the
desperate struggles and sufferings of
the Would-be merchant or banker, UNI
til he finally sinks in sullen despair to
his rightful station as street-car driv-
er or mOtOr1nan.
Many good people have thought
that if we could in some way sur
round the country youth with more
comforts and pleasures, If wecould re-
lieve the solitude and monotony ofthe
farm, he would stay at home and be-
come a wiser and better man. Nari-
Gus schemes to this end have been de
vised, and have come to naught. Not
discouraged by repeated failures,
philanthropists have kept up their
strivings in this direction. They have
even hoped to make country life so at
tractive that great numbers OF city
people would move out of town, and
thus relieve the congestion in certain
districts and industries of the city.
Nothing is more common than to re-
vile poor people in the slums of our
great cities because they will be so
foolish as to herd together in tene
ment-houses and foul-smelling alleys,
when they might be out on quarter
sections breathing the pure air of
heaven and looking abroad over the
boundless areas of vast prairies. tits
true that, since the Commissioner of
Labor has assured us that people in
slums have on the average about as
much money as other people, and that
the bacteria which inhabit their stuffy
rooms are not particularly dangerous
we have perhaps been more inclined
to leave the slums to their dirty hap
piness, and content ourselves with
thanking God that we are not as
other men-even these city-loving rag
amuffins. Still, the talk about pre-
venting the rush to the cities goes on.
Lately, however, a few students of
modern life have come to see and to
say that, while present industrial con-
ditions continue, the movement of
populations to cities will continue.
The fact is that, broadly speaking,
men leave the farms because they are
not needed there.
. The introduction of labor-saving
machinery and rapid transportation
have produced the same result in
agriculture as in other kinds of manu-
featuring. smaller number of men
working in our fields turn out much
greater product than the greater num-