Norwich bulletin., 1910-07-30
Education Tells for Improved Farming

fWritten Specially for The Bulletin.)
 Horace Greeley is reported as having
 once said: Of all horned cattle in 2
 newspaper office, Lord deliver me from
 a college graduate. Horace was .
 mighty good newspaperman in his day Whether the newspapers which he ant men like him made were better than
 those made today is a question by it.
 self and not for you and 1 to settle
 newspapers now is done by college
 graduates or men of similarly wide
 education and training. It is very
 doubtful if Greeley or Raymond or the
 elder Bennett, if they could return to
 Newspaper Row, would be able to get
 DN a single edition of one of the great metropolitan newspapers they found
 ed. The times have changed, whether
 flor good or bad; newspa pers have
 changed, whether for good or bad: re- uuirements for the work have changed. whether for good or bad, and different
 qualifications are demanded in the workers. l am speaking now mostly of beginners, those starting in fresh
 and green. After any two men shall
 have worked side by side for dozen
 years on any paper you win find it
 hard to tell which started In with the best equipment. The work itself is
 more educational than that of any
 possible institution formally devoted to education 1 have known newSpa per men who never saw the inside of q college. yet have become under the grinding and planning and abrasion of wholly admirable specimens of the highest education. But the fact re-
 mains that today the young man who enters a newspaper office for the first time after course of real education Is apt, other things being equal, to get along the faster and turn out. for a while, the better work.
 All Of which may be interesting or even important, but What on earth has it to do with farming and farm ers?' l fancy some of you asking.
 We'll, in the old days-about the same time that Horace Greeley was sneering at college men on newspapers farmers used to have just about the game idea of educated men on the farm They were looked at with sus- picion, watched with doubt. avoided whenever possible. If strange appIi- cant for work spoke admiringly of
 those fowls instead of them hens" the farmer promptly hedged. Neigh Dor Hoskins still holds by this idea
 When man applies for work he never asks him if he knows the botanical name of pigweed. but says: Show me your hands If they are more or less cracked up and rough. especially if they are well calloused on the palms at the base of the fingers and along the inside of the thumb, then HoskinS takes an interest in him and perhaps hires him. Once Hoskins hired husky looking chap who brought trunk with him instead of an old box and a trunk half full of books. at that ! never could learn that he. failed to do his work well, but Hoskins soon got Tld or hlm w said he once, thai feller had a whole cyclepeedera in his trunk. nd he useter to come in even in's with one pocket full O rocks and tother full O weeds nd set up till 10 clock sometimes, jest a-huntin' up the Latin names for 'em. Eh? Wy. yes, he cTd milk well enough Flow O. goods anybody. I guess. He could pitch hay and hoe corn and dig pota- toes and cradle oats, but Hoskins was afraid OF him all the while-afraid just because he was sufficiently edu- cated to make him interested in know ing about botany and geology. Hos kins was sure that this was an out and that the man sure to turn into good -for-nothin', sooner or later.
 That was the old idea about farnino, ss about many other highly practical arts; that theory only for dudes snd the only real thing was practice Eome old fellows like Hoskins still fllng to it. But l see a great change respect The simple truth is tha farming Is much more complicated md intricate business nowadays than J was when some of us were young The wider the schooling and the sharp fr the training and the deeper the learning of the man who begins it. the better are his early chances for rrOg- Tess in it. Of course you can't make ] philosopher of fool by sending him 70 college; nor can you make a good farmer of one by teaching him botany No more than you can make silk purse out of 3 SOw's ear But start f1g with a reasona ble equality of na- live intelligence, the youngster who has had the best schooling will usually eutfoot the mate who has been through 10 other training than that got behind The blow handles.
 Is 1t any practical service to me to 9Sw that the pesl1y weed commonly WHeo sorrei Is the 'Oxali5 Corni- rulata of Linnaeus? Or. perhaps the Rumex acetosella ?" Well, not so very much in truth. But why "OxaIis?'' l The word suggests oxalic acid. And 1 Eorrel IS certainly sour. Is there per haps- a relation between the two? My 1 smatterlng of botany results in an ap- 1 peal to my smattering of chemistry, l and find that oxalic acid gets it's | name from this very weed, which is 1 full of it. Indeed. the old nama of | oxalic acid was salt of sorreI" I am | also aware, thanks to the aforesaid | smattering of chemistry. that oxaIic l acid is a poison and that it's proper | antfdote is some form of aIkaIi like | lime Now comes in the question. If | iiine taken into my. system will nau- tralize the salt of sorreI why shouldn't | lime, added generously to a sorrel | infested garden. neutralize the acid in | the soil which nourishes the weed? We | IEX II ana We md that in connie of years the only sorreI on the Timed | patch is sparse stunted sickIv starved to death looking stuff while that on unlinned land beside it is quite as thrifty looking as ever.
 Now here was case where one working farmer found practical value fn knowing a very little botany and a very little chemistry. Perhaps I might have found out by accident in the course of years that lime will kill sor- rel. But I'm confident that I got at the useful practical knowledge a good deal quicker.
 Then there was the case of "The ! Little Lot Under the Hill" That's the name l knew 1t by as boy. After good many years of trial my father discovered. forty years ago, that com mon land plaster was a valuable fertil- fZing agent on one end of the narrow | field. while it gave absolutely no re- suits on the other end. I presume it cost him a dozen tons of the stuff and | several seasons work to reach this Walking across the field xxrtf h 1terf.tz