Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1909-05-15
HIIl's Advise to Farmers.

In j. J. Hill's address before the
Minneapolis merchants he had these
sensible things to say:
We might as well listen to the twit-
tering of the first robin in the pring
as to the report of the farm commits
sion which the administration appoint
ed last summer. These men spent
sixty days trying to find out what is
the matter with the farmers life. It
took England fifty years to discover
what was the reason her farmers were
leaving the farms for the cities. The
members of the farm commission
/ spent one-half of day at the state
agricultural school to find out what
was the matter with the farm life in
| the state of Minnesota.
The trouble with the people in the
cities is that they take no interest
in farm life whatever. How many of
the residents of Minneapolis or st.
| Paul have visited the agricultural col
lege and know what is being taught
there? And the young men and wo-
men attending the agricultural school.
Do they form any of the social life of
the state university? No, they are
entirely ignored and are considered
outsiders, hayseeds. This is not
right. The students of the state uni
versity would not be of any use what
ever if it were not for the farmers.
When was Is years younger and
had lot more enthusiasm and con-
siderable less knowledge, I spent a
great deal of money trying to get
farmers to raise cattle. spent $780,
600 of my own money distributing
grade stock, and what was the result?
Many of the hogs went for Christmas
pork. They sold the grade cattle be-
cause grade cattle brought about $5
piece more in the market than scrub
cattle, so they sold the grade cattle
and kept the scrubs.
One of the errors of the Minnesota
farmers is in not raising more live
stock.
A few years ago Denmark was one
of the poorest countries in the world.
The people were poor. About one
quarter of the population was gather
ed in one city, when women devel-
oped a system of dairying, which did
more for the kingdom than all its
kings and rulers have done for it in
the past thousand years. A small
country covering $1,000 square miles
and supporting population of 2,6oO,-
900, last year Denmark sold to Eng
land and Great Britain $35,O00,O0O
worth of dairy products and over $2S-
100000 worth of hams. They have
enough cattle to furnish fertilizer
for all the land they want to cultivate
for corn, and their lands yields 80 to
SO bushels to the acre. If we would
only cultivate our land to yield 80
bushels of wheat, it would yield $50
an acre. To get this wheat TO the
cities would cost about $3.50, and rent
of the land to the owner or renter is
worth $3.50 to put it at a low figure.
This would leave a profit of $22 per
acre. Much of this land is now yield
ing but 10 or IL bushels of wheat.
But how are we going to carry this
knowledge to the farmer? You say
that our state agricultural school is
doing that. But how many farmers
attend this school? Fancy all the
farmers in the state attending the
lectures given at the school. The
farmers are not going to send all their
children to the cities to school. What
we must do is to take the school to
the farmer and his children.
I am farmer by proxy and own
farm in the Red River valley. / instruct
ed my farmer to use all the manure he
obtained from the stock on the farm
and spread it over as many acres as
he could to get results. AS result
he raised 35 bushels of wheat to the
acre on 80 acres. The rest of the
farm raised about Is bushels, and
some of the neighpors raised but eight
or ten.
France has the largest banks in the
world and without the aid of these
banks no nation in the world can go
to war. These banks are supported
by frugal savings of the French farm
ers and it is owing to their industry
that France has such on important
place among the nations today.