The Hattiesburg news. (Hattiesburg, Miss.) 1908-1917, 1909-07-22


lander has had several years exper-
fence in the handling of garden truck
and would be an excellent man to
have at your meeting July 10th. Pos
sibly if you would drop him a line at
Vicksburgf extending an invitation,
that he would accept and could not
only give you freight rates but freight
Accommodations, which is a thing per-
haps more to be considered than the
rates.
have encouraged these associa-
lions at various points for several
reasons, prominent among which is
the good that always comes from get
ting people together who are engaged |
in the same line of business in order |
to discuss it in all of its phases For
instance, if you should have fifty far
mers who would engage in trucking
and they were all members of an as
ISOLATION, you could at minimum eX-
oughly posted come before the asso-
citation and discuss certain phases of
the business. Your association should
have at least one man who would
give special attention to markets and
market reports and through him these
reports would be given to each men,
Der of your association. You could
at the proper time have some one dis
cuss before your association the best
methods of packing, handling and
shipping. Your secretary should
spend little time and energy in as
pertaining the varieties that can be
grown in your particular locality with
! the best results. Indeed, there are
hundred things to be discussed before
an association such as you propose
to organize and for that reason | am
sure you are working along proper
/ lines and to my mind you are about to
do what you should have done long
ago, without having been forced to it
by the boil weevil. I must insist,
however, that the cotton growers of
Mississippi should not think for mo-
ment of abandoning the growing of
cotton. Your soil and climate is adap-
ted to that particular product and
cotton will always be one of the sta
pie crops of this country. Last year
it amounted to seven hundred million
dollars in the United States and was
2nd among all the crops grown in
this country and the boil weevil pest
while it may annoy the cotton grow
ers of Mississippi for sevearl years
is not going to drive them out of thu
| cotton business. You are going t.
: learn how to grow cotton in spite o
= the boil weevil, but you will not dc
q pend in the south on the northern
states for your meat, mules, hay
4 grain, etc. You will grow more corr
q feed more hogs, grow more cattle
q fruit and vegetables of all kinds an
K by thus diversifying your crops, you
3 farmers will in a few years be ind
pendent, as they are now in many {
y our northern states.
4 I have a farm of $50 acres. 3 1
n miles from here. I drove out theI
IA this morning, saw three teams plowin
n corn, a field of sixty acres Of as fir
n clover and timothy meadows as l eve
& saw, forty acres of fine oats an acl
q of potatoes, twenty-five Holstein COW
Il that are being MIXED on the place an
81 the cream separated from the mi
IA and sold, which now brings myself al
"a my tenants each about sos per mont
and the milk is being fed to fifty D
81 roc Jersey pigs. l found the tenant
M wife looking after about 100 CHECKER
u that have recently Matched and will
ready for market about Christina
time, together with as many MOI
Two year old, yearling and suckil
: colts in the pasture were looking fir
also a dozen spotted Holstein calvC
and they are beauties, are growi
into money. | mention this simply
enforce my point that diversified far
ing is the proper method for reachi
satisfactory net results and your fl
mers will very soon learn this by
perience.
My judgment is that the farmer W
would spend all of his time and en-
gy in growing cabbage or tomatoes
any other one variety Of vegetab
would be even more foolish than
who grew nothing but cotton, henc
would urge this upon your asso
ton; that your people do
abandon cotton growing. nor that Il
confine themselves exclusively to '
etables, but that they turn their
tention to such varieties of crops
are especially adapted to your soil
to your climate and that whate