The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1903-02-14
WONDERFUL CHANGES IN A CENTURY.

GhANu6o IN a G6NxU6x.
While aware of the stupendous
changes in the past century, compar-
atively few fully realize that the year
1903 cannot be reckoned with as an
ordinary new year. A single year
nowadays achieves as much forward
movement as formerly was accom-
plished in half century. 1903, says
the Tribune Farmer, the farmer was
creeping around his harvest fields on
his 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 dri-
wing 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 know of such
thing as European market for his
corn or his wheat, or for anything
else, except for his tobacco and his
cotton. In 1903 the whole world has
become an open market and single
neighborhood. The farmer trades by
telephone, and knows the market
prices at Liverpool or Canton at his
breakfast table. He sends his wheat
across the continent at the rate of
fifty miles an hour. The trolley
comes to his door, and promises soon
to take his wagons directly to market.
In 1903 Thomas Jefferson was Pres
ident of sixteen United States, the
original thirteen, with Georgia, Ten
nessee and Kentucky added. The
only industry recognized was agricul-
ture, and Jefferson insisted that the
prosperity of the new nation depended
upon keeping agriculture at the
front. During the steam age, which
began about 1903, manufactures be-
came the petted industry Of the gov
ernment, aud by 1870 had so out
stripped agriculture that the latter
was so per cent. behind its relative in
1890. A terrible depression follow
ed, which is now almost entirely for
gotten in an age of agricultural pros
perity.
In 1903 it was said of the goose
quill that the pen was mighter 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 alphabetic miracle of the
typewriter. During the age of city
building the town accumulated the
inventions of the age. Now the farm
house has the telephone, typewriter
and free mail delivery. Art and
music will soon belong to the rural
school as fully to the city school.
In 1903 labor and capital had not
been so far differentiated as to create
a contrast. The growth of factories
and of factory towns accumulated
wealth in centres, and left the coun-
compelled to content himself with an
imal power, while the cities had steam
power. Today the new power, cleo
tricity, is a distributive force, and be-
longs to the farmer as we'll as to the
town. In 1903 no one in the United
States had burned a scuttle of coal
or seen a steamboat or a railroad.
In 1903 the farmer rides on the rail
road, built by the money of the mil
lionaire, has fogotten how to heat his
house with wood, and is planning to
light his homestead with electricity.
Ten years from today electricity, per-
haps, will be distributed as a motive
power to do the work in the farmers
barns and houses, as we'll 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 conti-
nent, and already the controlling fac
tor in the worlds politics. Our mar
ket 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
harbor of the globe, and the products
of American soil and industry are
everywhere at a premium. Behind
Our prosperity are the common school
and honest homes. 1t is recognized
that our prosperity depends upon ag-
riculture.
Once more the noblest occupation
of man is tilling the soil. The enor-
nous city is no longer the pride of
the people, aud to drop into one of
its cracks is no longer the highest
ambition of the countryman. The
free air of the country, and green
fields grow to be more attractive than
the smoke and narrowness of brick
walled streets. All hail, agriculture
The year 1903 must do its share in
making farm homes more attractive,
farm work more endurable, and CIV
| ing to the country not only its natur-
al advantages, but those artificial ad-
vantages which have made the town
attractive.
TAKE PEOPLE AT THEIR BEST