The Salt Lake herald-Republican. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1909-1918, 1909-10-09
LEAVING DESKS
FOR THE COUNTRY
Indications of Reaction From
0verCrOWding in the Big
Cities.

Chicago. Oct. S.-Has the stupendous
growth of urban population in the
United States at the expense of rural
reached the turning point? When
Washington was president only "a per
cent of the 100000 people were in cities;
today at least 80 per cent of Uncle Sans
90,00O0O0 are in cities. But an era of
change is noted the country over; the
overcrowded cities are sending forth
armies of people as settlers to the 'new
country" the rural life again is potent.
THE cities are overcrowded; the re-
action has begun" declares Herbert
kaufman. a new America is in the
making. The next ten years will see
a century of progress squeezed into a
decade. Cost of living has so increased
the struggle and the striving and the
baCk-break and the heartache, for the
right to exist, have bred a revolution.
THE great chances no longer lie
among the crowds, but where the
crowds are in the making. America has
become laud-mad-the sanest madness
that ever stirred a people. Men are leav-
/ ing spots where building lots are sold
by the foot and are bringing the same
price into country where it viii COM
mand aCreS-WhCre they can live in the
| Open-WheTe there are no fences to am
bitiOn-where they can plan a bigger
fut>Ire for themselves and for their chill
dTen.
The city dweller has awakened to
the realization that he is entitled to
more out of life than the mere right
| to exist through it, Competition for
} every post from entry clerk to factory
! foreman is so intense that his imme-
I date earning powers are limited by the
/ long string of men ahead. and his in
! creases are controlled by a longer string
+ of men behind who are willing to I'M
/ deTbid for the bigger posts"
! Figures tell how the urban population
] has grown since the days of Washing
/ ton, how the crowding of the cities has
! gone on, the urban percentage of the
/ total of 1890 having grown slowly from
"a to g. per cent in 1880, when the
United States boosted 12,S66.020 people,
to 16,1 per cent in 1860, to 20.9 per cent
in 1870, and to 33.1 per cent in 1900, when
/ population reached 70, 46S, 900. From
10000 people in cities in 1890, the urban
residents have increased to 5000, 900 in
1900.
There was never a time when a
young man had less show in the old
towns and where he had a bigger play
for ability than he will find in the new
irrigated and drained lands, and in the
I hitherto inaccessible ranch sections now
/ available for culture, because coming OF
/ the railroads has made feasible their de-
! veiopment." Mr.. Kaufman continues in
his review of the situation in the
/ Woman's World. The same opportu-
mites which lay before the first settlers
. of Iowa and Kansas exist today in Flor
ida, in Louisiana, in Texas, in New
/ Mexico in Oklahoma, in southern Mis-
| souri,, in Arkansas, in southern Ala.
/ bama, and in the superb orchard and
grain countries of the northwest. The
. same chances without the same hard
ships and privations which the other
generation undeTwent-crude transpor-
tatiOn, rude sod house, unutterable
/ loneliness for the women. and years and
! years of uncertainty before the silver
lining turned.
This is another century, another era
and things are being done in another
| way. The railroad and the harvester
the needle and the thread of civilization
| are stitching a new robe for prosperity
In their trail are merchant and builder
| Wherever the smoke Of a locomotive is
seen, there follows the smoke Of COM
munities
The farmers wife no longer lives in
exile, starving for the sight of friends
with no recourse and no resource tc
| break the blank, blind, lonely stretches
She does not feel the constant haunt
ing dread that one by one, with theil
maturity, her boys and girls will leave
/ her side to seek a better and a bigger
| future in a distant town"