The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1900-04-20
Census Schedules.

To build up great office like the Census Office in
fifteen months from absolutely nothing to efficient
machine. employing about three thousand men in
Washington and about fifty thousand elsewhere in
the country is difficult task and entire success is
out of the question. The office naturally compares
itself with the stage of preparation attained at the
period ten years and tried by this test, it
has gained several months on its predecessor. One
of the problems before is how to put in the time
thus secured in sucha way as most to benefit the
Census.
In the Agricultural Division the need of time for
preliminary work is perhaps as great as anywhere
in the Census Office. Farmers, as class, do not
keep their accounts as well as manufacturers, and
the returns from farmers may occasionally include
serious errors which trained eye will at once
detect. Hence the farm schedules must be eXamin-
ed and such errors corrected before the tables
be made gp~frOm them with safety. If a farmer re-
ports that his land to wheat ten acres and
the Weld four thousand bushels it is clear that an
average Weld of four hundred bushels to the acre is
incredible, and must be rejected corrected in
accordance with the probabilities Sometimes the
truth can be made out by an expert from COmpar-
ison with entries IN other parts OF the schedules;
sometimes correspondence must be opened to settle
the doubt. All this ranks under the general head
OF verifying the schedules, and the Agricultural
Division plans to give all the time possible to the
work of verifying each of the millions of farm
schedules. To accomplish this in the time allowed
the work Ofseyeral hundred clerks will be required
and they must have hard and fast rHles to guide
them. For example, they might be told: When
the wheat reports show a product OF over forty
bushels 10 the acre. they are suspicious and must be
laid aside for an expert to pass upon. But any
such rules vary with the section of the country
yield OF twenty bushels in section might be
more questionable than yield Of forty bushels in
another. Hence the division must fix in advance
what is the range of reports in each part of the
country and for each crop that may be accepted
probable on their face and not uiring special
animation. To get the limits of probability for
this purpose for each county in the United States
that is, the maximum and minimum yield and the
maximum and minimum price which may be
cepted without verifcatiOn is the o beet of an
extensive correspondence now being carried on by
the Agricultural Division under the direction of
Mr.. l.. e. Powers, Chief Statistician in charge of
that division. Three simple schedules have been
prepared and printed on different colored paper in
from another. One of them covers ordinary garden
second covers fruits, and the third
the great staple field crops. Each asks about the
units of measure employed and the price realZ-
for staple field products and for vegetables ask for
the highest and lowest yield OF each crop per acre.
These schedules are being mailed to prominent
farmers all over the country and in many instances
returns have already been received. When the
returns have been received and tabulated, scheme
will be made from them of what is TO be accepted
Is correct in each case and what is to be probed
arther The only aim of the Office is to get what
vas really the intention of the farmer in answering
he questions. If the presuIn ptiOn is strongly
gainst his meaning what the schedule says, the Of
ice will try to learn by correspondence from the
uperyisor, or the Enumeration, or the farmer him
elf what the real facts were.
If the farming public will continue to cooperate
nth the hear tiness already displayed, this effort
rill result in more trustworthy census of farms
han has ever been taken. Farmers
class are less able to cooperate than the repre-
entatiTes of any other great industry. Hence the
ensus Office can do more for them than it can for
lines OF business, which can and do
lake their own investigation, and il will do its
est 10 present full and accurate photograph OF
ais leading occupation. The Director of the Census
rges every one interested to aid the work. a204w