Las Vegas daily optic. [volume] (Las Vegas, N.M.) 1880-1908, 1904-09-19

without charge.
The Swift Specific Company, Atlanta, Ga.
characterized in the half-complaining
comment Of a traveller who In cross.
ing the state Of Iowa saw spread out
before his gaze hundreds of miles OF
unbroken harvest fields, dotted here
and there with gigantic machines OF
the highest type whose noisy, grimy
engines were making ready the
worlds food.
I'VE can't call farming a pastoral
pursuit nowadays In your big west"
all gone out Of 1t; your modern west
ern farm is nothing but a noisy ma
chine shop; your farmers are all turn
ed mechanics, political economists,
men of affairs. What would their
simple old dads say II they could be
hold thisP"
A writer in Harper's Weekly Illus
trates the change most admirably in
the manner OF handling the corn crop
Of the present year.
Within the memory Of the men who
are still at work In the fields, says
he, the time Of human labor neces-
sary to the production of one bushei
of corn was four and one-half hours,
the labor cost being thirty-five cents,
In 1902 the time OF labor fell to forty
minutes, and Its cost to ten cents.
Every successive step has been modi-
fled; the horsepower shovel-plough
has given place to the steam gang
plough; the old methd of dropping
the seed by hand and covering 1t
with a %hand.hoe has yielded to the
machine which checks. plants and
overs in n operation while driven
rapidly across the face of the field;
cultivation Is better performed with
one.fourth the labor. the hand corn
knife has been supplanted by the
horse or steam power harvester. But
the most radical difference appears In
the final processes. The o%ld-fashion-
ed "husking-peg" is no more; and
along with IL has disappeared the gala
"huskingbee with its glamour Of
red ears and kisses. That labor Is
now all performed by huge machin-
cry; one may be pardoned for Won
dering whether the rural wight will
not o o be doing his very kissing by
steam power, SO thoroughly persuad.
ed is he becoming of its greater eff
cheney. And it is easy to remember
the day when eorn-shelling consisted
Of rubbing two ears together by hand,
or in scraping the ears across the
blade of hoe or shovel. by such print
tive mean a skilful laborer conVd
shell n bushel of grain in an hour
and a half; that is to ay, the she'll.
ing of the crop of 1902 would have
occupied the entire population of the
United States for more than three
months. But this is now accomplish.
ed by power machines, some o. which
have an hourly capacity Of 700
bushels.
Equal or even greater advance has
been made In the methods Of wheat
culture. Against the costly hand la.
Dor OF the last generation, which re.
quired the expenditure Of three hours
Of time to the production OF a hushos
of grain, modern machinery, having
wholly supplanted hand work, has re-
duced the time unit per hushel to
ten minutes Most remarkable Of all
implements Of the present day farm
Is the giant automobile harvester in
use in the Pacific slope wheatfields,
which cuts. threshes. cleans. weighs,
and sacks tho grain from a hundred
acres in a single day. Every other
industry OF the fields has shared in
the benefits of this new tendency
every process Is highly specialized.
The potential saving in the cost Of
labor IN perfected machinery and
modern methods was computed in
1899 on the production Of seven staple
crops in that year-wheat, oats, rye,