Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1908-10-17
INDIANA FARM HAND
GIVES SOME REASONS
Why Boys and Girls Desert
Farm Life for the City.
Lack of System and Too Long Hours, He
Thinks, is Driving the Best
Minds Away.


to President Roosevelt about the work
which the Country Life Commission
is carrying on. The president has
turned the letter over to the Coun-
try Life Commission and the Com
mission has asked the farmland to
write some more.
81 have been farmland just long
enough. = says the presidents cor
respondent, 'tto learn cause of so
many sons and daughters aud we'll
meaning, reliable faTmhands leaving
the beautiful farm and country and
going to the city. A lack of order
and system on the farm and too long
hours for day is what is driving the
best minds from the farm to the city
and shop. What can we expect of
a hand. or the farmers wife and her
posterity, in the way of intellectual
development when they get out of
their beds at 3 80 in the morning and
work from that time until s or 9 p.
m. And no attention paid TO the
sanitary conditions of the home, and
necessary conveniences on the farm
for doing the farm work with the
least labor and time.
This man has given the Country
Life Commission some very interest
ing first hand information about rural
conditions and recommendations based
on a long experience in farm work
and farm life. He has worked for
all kinds Of farmers, good and bad,
he says. and he has always had his
eyes open to detect the causes of their
success or failure. He has drawn his
own conclusions and sets them forth
in down right. straightforward fash
ion Education pays in farming, he
says. The farmer who plans out his
work and carries it through in sys-
telnatic, business-like manner, just
as the city man does. will be able to
shorten the hours of labor. So
many farumers measure everything
on the farm from the standpoint of
muscle, he continues, "and are
extreme in some things and slack
in Others. 1 decided several years
ago that life is too short to work for
Peter Tumbledown farmers.
''Now. Mr.. President, he writes
you can take this for what it is
worth. I have not given you half
of my experience. The Country Life
Commission has written him that his
suggestions are so useful that they
hope he will send more.
Compel the farmer to be bust
ness man. he says $50 into the
homes of some of the farmers and the
so-called farmers and ascertain how
they live, and learn of their methods
of doing the business in which they
are engaged. And you will be sur
prised what variety you will find.
Ascertain what they read and what
stress they put on the literature that
comes into their homes (if any comes)
bearing on the business they are en-
gagged in See what per cent study
their business.
"Give me the educated farmer as a
boss and the educated farmland as a
hand. When 1 come in contact with
a hand or farmer that studies his bust
ness L find him advancing, and it is
a pleasure to work for such men.
The majority of the farmers are
eight-hour men, that is. eight hours
in the forenoon and eight in the after
noon. Eight or ten hours on the farm
cannot we'll be adaped in all cases,
but it need not be from fourteen to
sixteen hours. If the family arise
every morning at o'clock and wife
and daughters attend to the household
duties. and the farmhands and sons
attend to the chores and go to the
field at 8 o'clock and work until II 80
and go to the field again at 1 and
keep at it until o'clock. and go to
the house and eat the supper and then
do the evening chores. they have done
a farm days work. Regular hours
for work, and regular hours for meals,
and regular hours for sleep, and
regular hours for rest and recreation,
with plenty of standard papers and
books, including the best agricultural
papers and books, and full faith in
God. and good grub is wanted.
'"The family should rise at O'clock
on Sunday morning as well as on
week days and do the necessary Sun
day morning chores, and then go to
church and show the business man
in the city that Sunday on the farm
does not consist in changing the
stock from one field to another, or
sailing it, or unloading load of hay
that was brought in on Saturday