Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-10-01

will always remain, a great agricultural
state. l hope that the means of trans
porting your commodities to market will be
steadily improved but this will be of no use
unless you keep producing the commodities,
and in the long run this will largely depend
upon your being able to keep on the farm
high type of citizenship. The effort must
be to make farm life not only remunerative
but attractive, so that the best young men
and girls will feel inclined to stay on the
farm and not to go to the city. Nothing is
more important to this country than the
perpetuation of our system Of medium
sized farms worked by their owners. We
do not want to see our farmers sink to the
condition of the peasants of the old world.
barely able to live on their small holdings.
nor do we want to see their places taken
by wealthy men owning enormous estates,
which they work purely by tenants and
hired servants.
At present the ordinary farmer holds his
own in the land as against any possible
representative of the landlord class of
farmer-that is, of the men who would
vast estates-because the ordinary
farmer unites his capital, his labor and his
brains with the making of permanent
family home, and thus can afford to hold
his land at value at which it not be
held by the capitalist, who would have to
run 1t by leasing it or by cultivating it at
arms length with hired labor. In other
words, the typical American farmer of to-
day gets his remuneration in part in the
shape of an Independent home for his fam
lily. and this gives him an advantage over
an absentee landlord. Now, from the stand
point Of the nation as whole it is pre-
eminenty desirable to keep as one of our
chief American types the farmer. the farm
home maker, of the medum-sized farm.
This type of farm home is one of our
strongest political and social bulwarks
Such a farm worked by the owner has
proved by experience the best place in
which to breed vigorous leaders alike for
country and city. 1t is matter of prime
economic and civic Importance to encourage
this type Of homecoming farmer.
Therefore, we should strive in every way
to aid in the education Of the farmer for
the farm, and should shape our school sys-
tenn with this end In view; and SO vitality
important Is this that, in my opinion, the
federal government should cooperate with
the state governments to secure the needed
change and improvement in our schools. It
Is significant that both from Minnesota and
Georgia there have come proposals in this
direction In the appearance of bills intro
duced into the national Congress The
congressional land grant act of 1852 accom-
plished much in establishing the agricul-
tural colleges in the several states and
therefore in preparing to turn the system
Of educational training for the young into
channels at once broader and more prac-
ticable-and what l am saying about agri-
cultural training really applies to all in
dustrial training. But the colleges can not
reach the masses. and 1t Is essential that
the masses should be reached Such aeri-
cultural nlgn ScnOOlS as those In Minnesota
and Nebraska for farm boys and girls
such technical high schools as are to be
found, for instance, in both st. Louis and
Washington, have by their success shown
that it is entirely feasible to carry in prac-
tical fashion the fundamentals Of industrial
training into the realms Of our secondary
schools. At present there is a gap between
our primary schools in country and city
and the industrial collegiate courses, which
must be closed, and, If necessary, the ma
ton must help the state to close it. Too
often our present schools tend to put alto
gether too great a premium upon mere
literary education, and therefore to train
away from the farm and the shop.
Home-Making and Housekeeping.
We should reverse this process Specific
training Of practical kind should be given
to the boys and girls who, when men and
women. are to make up the backbone Of this
nation by working in agriculture. in the
mechanical industries, in arts and trades
in short. who are to do the duty that should
always come first with all of us. the duty
of home-making and housekeeping. Too
narrow literary education is for most
men and women, not real education at ALL
for real education should fit people pri-
employments In which they must employ
the bulk of their activities. Our country
offers unparalleled opportunities for domes-
tic and social advancement, for social and
economic leadership in the world. Our
greatest national asset Is to be found In the
|achildren They need to be trained to high
ideals of everyday living, and to high eff