The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1909-06-05
TO KEEP THE BOY ON THE FARM.


Man is a gregarious animal. He
loves to lningle with his fellow-kind.
He breads isolation and solitude, con-
sequently he hunts the place where
the greatest number of people congre-
gate in the smallest space-the city.
Here he gratifes the Unborn instinct
to rub up against his fellow kind to
his hearts content. Sometimes he
smooths off the rough edges, becomes
a polished magnate and is heralded
from one end of the land to the other
as. a great man, born on the farm,
country bred, who has raised himself
from obscurity to the pinnacle of fame.
This is indeed a great commenda-
ton for the country bred youth and
for the country. But how many of
all the lads who leave good country
home for the city ever reach this high
place in life? Judging from the mea-
gre statistics at hand, the ratio is
about one in a thousand. The rank
and file of country lads who migrate
to the city merely fill in the cogs Of
corporation machinery wheels which
keep grinding away with the same
monotonous regularity year after year.
This is what the city offers to the
average youth. There is none of that
free and independent spirit which dis
tinguishes the country cousin from
his city relative. Yes, he satisfies
that Unborn craving to mingle with
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS all. He learns
more general cussedness in six months
than the pure-air country boy could
learn in lifetime. He loses that in
dependence and good spirit which
characterized his country days, and he
lives in small dark room with few,
if any, comforts.
But in nine cases out of ten the boy
leaves the farm simply because he
loses interest in country life. There
is all the opportunity to rub up against
his fellow kind in the country that
any country youth needs. Why does
he lose interest in the country! There
are a great many reasons, and the
greatest is the lack of proper recrea'
ton. 1t is a mighty tough PROPOSE
ton to toll all day in the hot sun, and
at night when the chores are done
lounge around the house until bed
time. The mind is not in very re-
ceptive or pleasant mood. This is
when the youth begins to brood on
his luck. He says: "Why cannot
get out of this drudgery and have
glimpse of life 7" And before he re-
allies the magnitude of the step, he
bids his father, mother, brothers and
sisters adieu and wends his way to the
city.
There is way to stop this unnat-
ural migration, and, strange as it may
seem, it is nothing more or less than
the automobile or auto buggy. Every
farmer who has a son stricken with
city fever will find in an automobile
the surest remedy for speedy cure.
A farmer, speaking about his four
sons, said that all of them got the city
fever. The oldest left the farm about
six months ago and got good job in
Chicago. The father found that the
other boys were getting restless and
decided to buy car. 1.-THE upshot
of the whole matter is" he adds,
that the three boys learned to run
the machine, and we take ride every
night after the chores are done. They
got to writing their brother in Chicago
about the fun they were having and
he came home last week. Said he
guessed the farm was good enough
for him. This pleased his mother
nightly" 1t surely did, and his
father too, for that matter.
There won't be any more grum-
bling about hard work in that family.
Every night they take spin of rs or
30 miles, and thoroughly enjoy every
inch of it. When the atmosphere is
hot, the family rid themselves of the
irksomeness and closeness of the house
and when they are spinning along the
road they inhale that life giving oxy-
gen which is so essential in rebuilding
the broken down tissues of the human
body. This is just the kind of recre-
alton the country youth needs. There
is exhileration in being at the wheel,
in operating the brake, clutch, spark
and gas control.
1t requires skill to run a car eco
nomically. This the boy acquires,
and be is gaining knowledge of gas
engines that is invaluable to him. He
takes an interest in good roads, be-
cause much of the pleasure in auto
MODELLING depends on good roads.
When he returns from a spin, the
tired feeling has disappeared. He
retires, sleeps soundly, and the next
morning he is in a cheerful frame of
mind and ready for hard days work.
The family talk about the previous
nights ride when they are assembled
around the table. They have travel
ed sections of their own county they
never had seen before. They have
called upon their neighbors IS miles
away, and are taking the ride over
again in their happy imaginations.
Laughter instead of dismal forebo-
dings, and keen interest in every
thing that pertains to country life, is
the order of things in that household
now.
That farmer has rural mail delivery,
telephone, and the country huckster
wagon delivers groceries to his kitch-
en- door twice week. After he pur-
chased his automobile he broke the
last thread that separated him from
the rest of mankind. 1t enabled him
to give vent to that gregariousness in
his makeup; it practically annihila-
ted distance so that the farmer and
his family visit all the neighboring
county fairs Charles Warner IN
Country Gentleman.