Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1898-05-05

At meeting held some time ago at
Colusa, Cal. in the interest OF irrlga-
tion, one of the speakers, Mr.. George
II. Maxwell, strongly advocated state
ownership and control of irrigation
works. He claimed the state could get
back every dollar invested in irrigation
and that the direct benefit to the state
would be enormous. In the course of
his remarks he touched several sub
jects OF general interest, whether his
views be endorsed or not. He said for
instances:
1.-THE trouble with our irrigation de-
vclopment in California has been that
we have not recognized the indisput-
able fact that irrigation for large areas
to wheat or staple crops will not pay
for the construction OF costly irrigation
works. If California Is to realize the
fun possibilities OF prosperity which
can come for the development by irri-
CATION of her arid or semi-arid lands
we must recognize the broad fact that
irrigation must go hand In hand with
intensive farming-the farming Of
small tracts to diversified products. In
fact, farming for home and living
rather than for a business or on a
large scale for profit. 1t Is the man
who wants to build UP home on ten
acres of land from which, by his own
labor on his own land. he can produce
his own food and his own living and
provide comfort and plenty for his
family, who needs Irrigation. 1t is
true there are comparatively few men
now who know how to do this or real
Ice the latent possibilities of ten acres
of land with water for irrigation. But
"a q ttFh4 IL. ,.ttII
this is source Of livelihood and COM
fort for our millions OF laborlng men
who are now idle-wlthout work in
cities because there Is no work for
them to do. There are over three mil
lion workers idle In the United States
today. The tendency uf modern in
vention Is to do away with the need of
ployed is constantly increasing. What
are they to do? They cannot starve
and there is no source to which they
can go for food except to go back to
Mother Earth and get 1t with their
own labor directly from the land. The
problem with them Is how to get food,
and there Is no food for them unless
it." -'
Speaking of the necessity OF giving
men an education that will enable them
to become their own employers and
make them more sure of employment as
long as they live. he said:
I'm every agricultural county in Cali.
fornia there should be farm training
stations where any Industrious man.
VINO wanted to go back to the land and
TIL 1t for u living, could learn how to
do It,
our whole system for the education
OF youth Is radically wrong. 1t ignores
what should be the ultimate object of
all education-to train a boy to earn an
honorable livelihood by his labor. The
ideal that Ia now set before every how
Is to become millionaire. All cannot
be millionaires, and in this ambition the
multitude must fail. What the state
should do is to educate producers
farmers and miners-and train every
boy so that he Will know how to get a
living for himself and family from ten
acres of land. Then let II be recog
nized and taught to every boy that an
honorable Independence and a home on
the land Ia the highest ideal of Amerl-
can citizenship. Nine-tenths OF the
boys who are now graduated from our
state university are unified by their
education from earning their living.
They are trained in theories hut in
nothing practical. Our state university
should be a college of agriculture and
mihing-nothing else. There liz no rea-
son why the state should educate doc
tors and lawyers-we have too many of
them now. What we want in Californi,
is farmers and miners and a race of
people trained to practical realization
or the fact that Il man who has the
requisite training, with wife trained
on the same lines, can have more OF the
genuine comforts and satlsfactions of
life, with the highest culture and re-
nnpmpnt In n rilrn1 homo 81
on fertile lands than In any other occu-
patton for he can produce by his own
labor comfortable living, and gradu-
ally lay by n competence for his old
age, and all through his life be build
ing a home where every charm exists
which that word implies"
Every earnest word In favor of the
rational education OF our youth Is time
ly. A thousand prosperous rural COM
munities is greater benefit to a coun-
try than n big city with its poverty.
slums and vice, spreading corruption
far and wide.