The times dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1903-1914, 1907-07-07

fed that this subject may be taught
in all farmers schools." A comments
tor on the departments plan says:
.'The ono great need OF farmers edu-
neglected, Is the business education or
training; he ought to be both
farmer and business man."
All this shows an amazing Innocence.
After natural selection has done its
work and taken the natural business
them UP In business, now we are to
take what is left, over one-third OF
the adult male population, and make
them aH rule business men! If the
business colleges should propose to
make their students business men Off
hand. instead OF good clerks and
istenographers we should plainly see
the abaurdity OF the idea: yet no
one laughs when Mr.. Wilson sets to
work to make all the clodhoppers bus
iness men,
There Is a spathetic side to this farm
4ers' education nonsense. Like the poll
5ucal adulation poured out on him, the
educational idea tickles and fools the
farmer. 1t makes him satisfied to be
n one-horse producer, and encourages
him to think he can learn some Smart
Alecls," tricks OF trade by which he
can get ahead of the business game.
This foolish talk encourages the farm-
ers In their stupid. poverty stricken
Independence" and makes them so
contrary and stubborn that It Is im-
possible to get them into any practi-
cable business organization.
Intellectual force may be applied by
Its possessor to farming in three
ways:
!. In directing, his own labor. 2. In
directing the labor OF others. 8. In
organizing the business OF farming and
reducing It's operations to routine.
1t Is wrong to teach the really force
full man engaged in farming that he
viii be making the most OF himself and
doing his whole duty to mankind and
civilization II he merely makes a little
more than his living as q working
| farmer. Brain power Is SO scarce and
| important that what exists should be
| worked to the utmost advantage. and q
| good brain force operating only one
| pair of hands Is not working to ad-
vantage. 1t is absurd that. In q great
and difficult industry like farming,
every worker should be expected to
| be .laborer and manager combined.
One OF the latest fads Of the agri-
| cultural educators is to have farms
1 run at public expense for the purpose
| of demonstrating to the surrounding
1 farmers proper methods. Pursuant to
1 THIS notion. Mr.. 7. I. Sandy, Of Burke
| Vile. who has farmed cheap broom-
straw land successfully, is to be put
| In charge Of Demonstration farms or
4 fields IN his vicinity. 7
But the business way Is for Mr..
/ Sandy to go ahead and continue to do
1 something he can do we'll Let him
get the bankers behind him and ex-
4 Nottoway county, and become the
Rockefeller Of the farming OF South
side Virginia.
He could make money and pay
good wages. The working farmer who
4 cannot succeed In his farming as Mr..
SANDY has done. could do better re-
ceiving Mr.. Sandy's good wages and
working under his direction than he
could by seeing Mr.. Sandy work his
demonstration fields .ands then trying to
/ do the trick himself. He has not the
ABILITY. II he had he would have done
the trick long ago. He has been told
over and over again, how to do It.
1 Successflll men do things, and. they
do as much as they can. That IS the
a way they benefit themselves and every.
s body else. -
Only In farming does the success.
/; ful man go around telling others how
i to duplicate his success and expect
every Tom. Dick and Harry of them
to actually do 1t. e.
When a merchant finds he is doing
successful business he keeps his
n secrets and enlarges his business. He
does not go around harangu!ng all the
y clerks and small merchants about be.
coming successful merchants by means
or his trade secrets. He knows that not
one IN thousand connected with the
mercantile business can be successful
ana IT Is so with the farmers
{ me farmers problem is an economic
one not an educational one. It is 4
question OF organizing the Industry ant
reducing It to routine. that. witt
the available Intellectual force. Il
may be manageable. Incidentally. W.
may remark. that 1t is largely q ques
ton OF capital.
one cannot do business under mod
ern conditions without capital. and
!, under modern conditions farming mus
pc business to be successful. In fact
the successful farmers SO much ad
1nlred. are those who have really sue
, ceeded in making business OF theil
employment, many OF them under tn,
disadvantage of employing no one bu
], themselves. thereby reducing a ma,
OF really intellectual force to the leve
OF mere laborer MS to large par
! OF his efforts, to the detriment of tn,
Industry at large. and OF every bod,
engaged therein who have the econo
mic right to have the benefit Of tn;
!, personal and immediate direction o
the forceYul engaged In the business
:. II The h,IainaSa az Pa 1,,tII