Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1909-08-11
HILL TO THE FARMER.

James ]. Hill of the Great North
ern stopped at Grand Forks the
other morning on his way from Du-
luth, met a delegation of city OIL
Gals and commercial men, talked
with them and through them to the
farmers Of the state, in his usual
broad and practical vein. Mr.. Hill's
address, as reported by the Herald,
was to the point and worth reproduce
ing:
now the important thing is to take
care of it. Get it cut. Every man
must understand that it does not pay
to take any chances. Nobody knows
what may happen to the crop as
long as it is in the field. Hall may
knock it out, rain may spoil 1T, and
almost anything may happen to the
crop as long as it Is IN the field.
And when 1t is cut and threshed
do urge your farmers not to rush it
all onto the market at once. We can
take care of it as fast as 1t can be
delivered at one end and unloaded
at the other. But don't glut the
market. You can't get price If you
YOU do that. This crop ought to
bring a good price. We all want to
see that. But it won't bring a price
If it is dumped in all at once. Peo-
pie are not going to bid actively on
an article that is being rushed to
market faster than it can be stored
or manufactured. Last year l tried
the experiment of holding my wheat
l kept it at home until the rush was
over. This gave me time to get my
fall work done. I sold the wheat
later around a dollar and a quarter
a bushel. My neighbors who hur-
ried their marketing got about 85
cents. I made money on the crop
by waiting, and I got my work done.
The average farmer can do the same
thing if he is a good manager. Pos
sib1y he needs some money in the
fall to pay his expenses. Very we'll.
He can get it. The banks will sup
ply him, and he can better aford to
pay the interest than to dump his
crop on a glutted market and spend
his time hauling when he should be
getting his land in shape for an
other crop.
We are raising only little more
wheat in this country than we use.
Our production is big in the aggre-
gate, but our consumption is increas-
ing faster. This year we will raise
perhaps 10000, 900 bushels more than
we need for home consumption. We
may actually sell 100000 bushels.
We do that right along: But we
will do what we did last year. After
shipping all the grain out of the
northwest faster than the market
can absorb it along toward spring
we will begin shipping back from the
Atlantic ports, sweeping the eastern
bins clean, and redistributing the
wheat from Chicago and Kansas
City. That is a waste of effort, and
it does not help the North Dakota
farmer whose crop has already been
sacrificed. What happens when you
have big crop and 1t 10 rushed ito
market? Tables of receipts are pub
lished every day. The buyer reads
that the, receipts today are so many
millions more than at the CORES
ponding period last year. Down
goes the price, two, five, ten cents
busheI. And at the same time the
worlds conditions may JUSTIFY a
much higher price, and the higher
price will be realized later on when
things have had time to adjust them
selves.
+ Every year marks an increase in
the price of northwestern lands, but
prices are still a long way from
where they belong, and where they
can be placed. Properly farmed
every acre of good land in the north
west is capable of yielding a profit
Of SIS. OF course 1t doesn't do It.
why? Just because the land isn't
being treated right. Its fertility is
not being kept up. The yield is not
what 1T was There Is no reason