The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-03-15
LANDLORDS NOW NOT FARMERS
UNCLE RUBE rs MOVING TO TOWN
AND LIVING on HIS Rents.
A New Phase Of Western Agricultural life
Which Is Worrying some Professors
They're Afraid Prosperity Is Ruii'-
Ing the Man Who Guided the Pho IN.

IUS tnt WAN Vho eutueu WIZ ." -
LINCOLN, Neb., March i?.-Ncbraska's
theoretical economists are alarmed over a
new and rather unique phase which they
call .the menace Of landlordism in the
West
It's all because the Western farmer has
insisted on raising such bumper crops Tor
the last five or six years. and the rest OF
the world has forced him to accept large
prices for what he has produced. II has
now become an aphorism that the farmer
who owns Nebraska or Kansas land Is a
rich man and could get richer. but Is at
present rich enough to retire from follow
ing the plough
Several Of the professors at the State
University have been giving little talks
recently about what they declare is bad
thing for the country. The bad thing Is
that a farmer gets rich before he gets old
Each spring and fall there is a big hegira
from the farms to the towns and cities
of men who have made their pile in the
wheat fields and want to rest TO and educate
their children. Most OF these men expect
to and do live on the rentals from their
farms In the eastern section of Nebraska
n good quarter section is worth. according
10 its improvements. from $4,000 10 5000.
II is comparatively easy for its owner to
pet from $500 TO $500 year rent in cash, or,
n he Is willing to take chances Of crop,
10 do even better by making il grain rent,
third of the crop.
Usually farmer isn't satisfied TO retire
unless he has half section, and tits gives
him income enough in a town to give the
boys and girls a run for their money and,
with his simple tastes, to live well.
This, the Mortified professors say, will
lead TO the degeneration and decentralization
of the Western farmer, and will soon place
agricultural conditions on the same level
as in England, Germany and Austria with
landlords living Ia luxury in the cities and
the terantry impoverished. Usually. how.
ever. there is not much Of the bloated bond
holder about the retired farmer "a he ap-
pears to-day, though possibly the second
generation from the soil may disclose
different condition.
Il is worthy Of more than casual note
that there has been a great shifting OF
population in the great grain belt In recent
years. great many farmers have gone
10 the towns and cities. This js not. as IL
once was. a hezira of the boys and girls
alone but Of the whole family. In their
places there have gone many from the
cities ana tOWns, men WHO nave Dttu eye
witnesses OF the big money made by the
agriculturists. men who have seen the FAR
mer get enough for his whe 1t crop or his
alfalfa cuttings Of one year almost 10 pay
the cost OF another quarter section.
Most Of the tenants, however, are boys
from the adjoining farms, who, as they
grow of age, marry and start out for them.
selves. The trouble with the professors
logic is that few Of these hustling fellows
long remain renters. II the owner won't
Ill, Al a. IL H.. n,,I Lar
has been a tremendous lot Of theee sales
this spring, so many as to cause general
comment.
One unique feature Of the recent ten
dency 10 landlordism Ii that in a number
OF casss where long leases have been given
the original renter has found ii possible
TO initiate his lessor by subletting the land
and doing "a little idling himself. while he
collects the advance In rents. due to the
high prices of food products and abundant
crops,
Weupostod men say that half Of the
farms Of Iowa and IS per cent. OF those In
eastern Nebraska are being operated by
tenants, and that the tendency In 20 an
not all owned by retired farmers. Eastern
Investment companies which were com
PEELED to take over some of their pledged
lands are holding them as better than gilt
edged bonds, and many townspeople put
their savings into farms when they we're
Stories are coming into the State Agri-
cultural Society's headquarters about big
Profits made in alfalfa growing. The
Q ~ rival those told last summer about
ie wheat Weld and the returns. In some
instances six and even seven crops were
cut and sold, with net results Of from SIS
10 so an acre. The secretary tells a story
of a Kansas man, one Cottrcll. who has
been preaching alfalfa everywhere. Out
IN central kansas one night he stopped with
a despondent farmer He had tried corn
and found II wouldn't thrive. his wheat was
also a failure.
Guess I'll pack up and go back to my
vife's relations in Illinois, he said
Ever tried ALFALFA asked Cottrell.
Nope
Then don't bother your wifes folks
until you have done 80. They probably
haven't got more than enough themselves
10 winter on. III send you some seed
Cottrell kept his promise. A few years
later he passed that way again, and stopped
10 see his former acquaintance The wife
recognized him ~ ~" door
You're the alfalfa man. amt your size
said interrOgdtNely
We.
We'll don't know whether ! ough, to
l~' YOU Ia 81 not
'wly, didn't the sod ! sent you krow''
he Ask-i
Grow why. man. the trouble 10 we've
e~-'a hay.n' over sincr and never had time
Tor anything els.s