The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1909-04-13

violence.
But the private citizens own law
could not suffice. Two women for
instance, within a half mile of Lexing-
ton, We're frie htened into destroying
their tobacco plant beds. Their
barns WOULD burn if they did not. they
We're warned. Lexington itself was
threatened, and then Brooksville, in
Braeken county, was raided.
The pool" The "Burley Society,""
'Equity?" What Ices it all mean2
Let Us study the causes that led to
the effects 7 have very briefly indi-
Gated. Given an era of organized
crime; midnight transformations BY
mob strength, the flashing With thorns
OF a neighbor, the burning Of his barn.
yolieys Of bullets poured into his win
dows among his wife and children,
/ the release OF the culDrits in the hour
that they face q court Of justice-and
what is the cause
The desire to add a few cents to the
price of q pound of tobacco.
The farmer of the Kentucky valleys
sells tobacco because he raises tobac-
co. His State. produces more than
one-third. of the tobacco grown in the
United States. Some eighty-iVe OF
his one hundred and pineteen counties
-one~third of q million acres
either flourish or decay because of
tobacco. He piles this weed up every
year to the total Of a quarter of a
billion Aounds. For it he puts into
his pocket sixteen or eighteen million
dollars.
Let us suppose now that this farm
er sees only one man to whom he
may sell his tobacco. Perhaps there
are other purchasers, but they are not
visitors to all the tobacco barns
throughout the district. and the farm
product (Which means packing it in
ef has not learned to prize his
h~ogsheads) and ship it to market. So
that no matter how many buyers he
might find in LOuisvilleaor Cincinnati,
he~sees only the buyer who comes to
his farm. And that buyer represents
a trust. And where is the farmer
who has not learned to hate the very
word "Trust?"
Hatred in time grows to despair.
And when the one chief buyer-the
trust-refuses to add the few cents the
farmer want you have q situation
throbbingly equivalent to warfare. It
is the situation in Kentucky.
SO the mystery clears. Despite ever
needs only opportunity to become vio-
lence. We can comprehend perfectly
how stress drives the farmers to COM
hina that they may force the buyer to
terms. But Why, by all that is mys-
%terious, does the punishment-arson
and assassination-strike down on the
farmers own n~eighbors, farmers like
himself and equally concerned regard
ing starvation? Why not Oh the
common oppressor who withholds the
EeNtra pennies. 1t is necessary to
pause and study ont the answer.
There are three or FOUR tobacco dis
trictS in Kentucky. There's the Dark
! Leaf OF the Black Patch. ThenSthere's
the Bufley of the Blue Grass. The
Dark Leaf grows in Western Ken
lucky and across the line in Tennes-
see. Dark leaf is sold mostly for eX-
port. Burnley requires. a fine fertile
soil like that in Central kentucky. and
beyond in Ohio and Indiana. It is: a
rich yellow aeaf of a class between
the dark expert and h light Mary
land smoking tobacco. The lighter
leaves are also used for the pipe,z but
the bulk of the crop goes in the home
consumption OF plug and twist chew
ing tobacco, because Of its especially
desirable absorbent qualities. The
present article is concerned only with
the Burnley and the Blue Grass dis
tricts. The Dark Leaf districts, are
reserved for q future article. .
AS to the merits, first of adding a
few cents to- the pound: The produc-
ton of .Burley tobacco costs heavily.
An acre of II represents an outlay
about equal &C the value Of theG1and.
I The government reports give the cost
Of producing an acre of HBnrleys to-
bacco at SIS and the average yield at
about nine hundred and sixty pounds,
which would put the cost per pound at
seven and. thlrteen-nineteenthSz cents.
This estimate is perhaps high, but
actual farm experience shows that. the
. tobacco has cost six and One-ha1f
j cents by the time it reaches the barn.
. Unfavorable weather. conditions bring
it easily to Sc. en- cents. The charges
for drying and marketing are yet to
4 follow.
A price of eight cents per pound is
required to compensate the farmer for
his own labor and Expenses. A
!, 1 price higher than eight cents is re-