Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1908-06-03

about this stupendous prosperity of
American farmers. Why? Because
it is SO recent. The era Of big prof
it's began barely ten years ago. There
was time when the blue-ribbon
New Farmer was the man who grew
wheat in the Red River Valley. He
was the aristocrat of the west. His
years work was no more than a few
weeks Of blowing and sowing and a
few days of harvesting. Even this
was done easily, sitting on the seat
of a machine and driving team Of
splendid horses. After harvest, he
cashed in, carried a big check to the
bank, and settled down for long
loaf or trip to the old homested in
the east.
But it was the bad year Of 1898
that first put the farmers, the coun-
try over on the road to affluence.
Up to that time it was their usual
policy to depend upon a. single crop.
One farmer planted nothing but
wheat; another planted nothing but
corn; third nothing but cotton, and
so on. But in 1898 the prices of
wheat, corn and cotton fell so low
that the farmers profits were wiped
out. This disaster set the farmers
thinking and in four years they had
changed over to the new policy of
diversified farming.
Instead of putting all their work
upon one crop, they planted from
three to dozen different crops each
year. They manufactured their corn
into cattle. They gave the soil a
square deal in the matter of fertil-
ization. They learned to plant bet
ter seed and to pay attention to the
weather bureau. They studied the
market reports. And, best of all,
they swung over from muscle to ma
chinery, until today the value of ma
,chinery on American farms is fully
a thousand millions.
ssAll this amazing progress that I
have been describing is by no means
the best that the New Farmer will
do. It Is merely what he has done
by the aid of machinery. What he
will do by the aid of science remains
to be seen. VI
Scientific agriculture is young.
1t has had to wait until machinery
prepared the way, by giving the farm
er time to think, and money to spend.
The first scientist who took notice of
farming was the Frenchman, La
voisier. He found out the compost
ton of water in 1888, and was in
the midst of many discoveries when
a Paris mob hauled him to the gull
lotine. The famous Liebig next APP
peared and founded the first agricul-
tural experiment station. Then came
Berthelot-the father of synthetic
chemistry, with his sensational an
nouncement-t.T The soil is alive
To-day the New Farmer finds
himself touched by science on all
sides. He knows there are more
living things in one pinch of rich
soil than there are people in the
whole globe. He knows that he can
take half a dozen handfulls Of earth
from different parts of his farm,
mix them together, send one thin
blefu1l to a chemist, and find out
exactly the kind of crop that will
give him the best harvest. And
more, now that science has given
him peep into natures factory, he
can even feel a sense of kinship be-
tween himself and his acres, because
he knows that the same elements
that redden his blood are painting
the green hues on his fields and for.
ests.
There are now fifteen thousand
New Farmers who have graduated
from agricultural colleges, and since
the late Professor w. c. Atwater
opened the first American experiment
station in 1875, fifty others have
sprung into vigorous life. There is
also at Washington an agricultural
department which has become the
greatest aggregation Of farm-scien.
TESTS In the world. 70 maintain
this department, Uncle Sam pays
grudgingly eleven millions a year
He pays much more than this to give
food and blankets to horde Of lazy
Indians, or for the building Of two
of three warships. But it is at least
more than is being spent on the New
Farmer in any other country.
Step by step farming is becoming
sure and scientific profession
The risks and uncertainties that for.
merly tossed the farmer back anf
forth, between hope and despair, are
being mastered. The weather bu
reau, which sent half a million warn
ings last year to the farmers, has
already become SO skilfull that six
sevenths of its predictions come true
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