The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1903-01-22
THURSDAY, JANUARY %, 1908.
WONDERFUL CHANGES IN A CENTURY.


changes in the past century compar-
atively few fully realize that the year
1908 cannot be reckoned with as an or
binary new year. A single year nova
days achieves as much forward move
ment as formerly was accomplished in
half a century. In 1903 says the Iri-
blt7le Farmer, the farmer was creep
ing around his harvest fields on knees,
cutting down his crops by hand. He
laid each sickleful down as he went,
and then gathered it up by hand, to
be bound into bundles, and once more
by hand tossed it upon his wagon.
Today he travels about his harvest
fields on his reapers driving his horses,
while machinery does his work for
him. In 1903 there was not one mile
of railroad on the globe. The farmer
did not even knows of such thing as
a European market for his corn or his
wheat, or for anything else, except
for his tobacco and his cotton. In
1908 the whole world has become an
open market and single neighbor.
hood. The farmer trades by tele-
phone, and know the market prices
at Liverpool or Canton at his break
fast table. He sends his wheat across
the continent at the rate of fifty
miles an hour. The trolley comes to
bic door oDd YrornicoO SnOn +o toIyo
his wagons directly to market.
In 1903 Thomas Jefferson was Presi-
dent of sixteen United States, the Or
riginal thirteen, with Georgia, Tenn
essee and Kentucky added. The only
industry recognized was agriculture,
and Jefferson insisted that the pros
perity of the new nation depended
upon keeping agriculture at the front.
During the steam age which began
about 1880, manufactures became the
petted industry of the government,
and by 1870 had so far outstripped
agriculture that the latter was 80 per
cent behind its relative position in
1880. A terrible depression followed,
which is now almost entirely forgotten
in an age of agricultural prosperity.
In 1903 it was said of the goosequill
that the pen was mightier than the
sword. In the hands of Franklin and
Jefferson it certainly ruled the world.
In 1903 the poet and the statesman, AS
we'll as the warrior, ply the steel; the
pen has passed away before the alpha
bette miracle of the Typewriter. Dur
ing the age of city building the town
accumulated the inventions of the
age. Now the farmhouse has the
telephone, the typewriter and free
mail delivery. Art and music, will
soon belong to the rural school as
fully as to the city school.
In 1903 labor and capital had not
been so far differential as to create
contrast. The growth of factories
and of factory towns accumulated
wealth in centres, and left the coun-
try in the rear. The farmer was
compelled to content himself with
animal power, while the cities had
steam power. To-day the new power
electricity, is distributive force, and
belongs to the farmer as well as to
the town. In 1903 no one in the Unit
ed States had burned a scuttle of
coal or seen steamboat or a railroad.
In 1908 the farmer rides on the rail
road, built by the money of the mil
lionaire, has forgotten how to heat
to light his homesteadw with electricity.
Ten years from to-day electricity, per-
haps, will be distributed as motive
power to do the work in the farmers
barns and houses, as well as to carry
his grain to market and his wife to
her shopping.
In 1903 the United States meant a
little strip along the Atlantic coast.
1t now means fifty States instead of
fifteen covering one-half the CONT
nent, and already the controlling fac
tor in the worlds politics. Our mark
ct extends across both oceans. Two
thirds of our exports consist of agri-
cultural products, feeling their way
into the heart of Africa, the heart of
Asia and commanding the markets of
Europe. The Yankee is in every har-
Dor of the globe, and the products of
American soil and industry are every
where at premium. Behind our
prosperity are the common school and
honest homes. 1t is recognized that
our prosperity depends upon agricul-
ture.
Once more the noblest occupation
of man is tilling the soil. The enor-
nous city is no longer the pride of the
people and to drop into one of it's
cracks is no longer the highest am