Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1910-12-24
Two Kinds of 1Baek 10 the Farm"

TWO NtnoS or BACK 10 the r dTH'
Ten per cent. of failures in the
back-to-th e-land tide is not q bad pro-
portion, when the class of those who
are seeking the country is considered.
A New York writer says the city man
is going back to the farm; that the
report just issued of one company
shows sales in two years of nearly $780,
900 acres, largely to city men and wom-
en-, but that the selling seems only to
have got fair start, for the sales
OF November were $4,000 acres, which
shows a growing rather than a dimn-
ishing exodus from the city fiat. At
the same time, other companies have
sold thousands of acres in other places,
and continue to bid in the buyers from
all points of the compass.
There is a pathetic side to the list
Of those who have failed, most OF
them men who lacked capital and
Judgment. but who threw themselves
at the feet of nature expecting mir
acle to be performed. OF these, some
are making their way pitifully back,
and others are cking out a miserable
existence, in various parts of the coun-
try. whittier they have been lurod by
the fascinating literature of tie land
companies. This is not n wholesome
or natural back -to-the-farm" move
ment. 1t is artificial and brought
about by the mercenary methods OF
statesmen rather than by natural
wish to get nearer to nature.
The natural desire of all those who
have once enjoyed country life leads
them to investigate anything pertain
ing to an escape from the confines OF
the dirty and care-laden city. Tho
success of the Chicago land show was
conspicuously due to the city man
because he and his yearning and his
wife and her yearning lead them into
the throngs moving from one exhibit
to another and devouring with long
ing eyes the literary pictures of pas
toral scenes.
No doubt the cost Of living figured
largely in this turning farmward, and
the city man who, q few years ago,
would have sneered at the suggestion
OF his becoming a farmer, has become
an eager student Of intensive cultiva-
ton methods. The most promising
feature in the rural movement is found
among the families of Eastern cities
who have at some time lived On
farm, CT who have spent vacations
there and have acquired the yrarninG
for country life without the inspira-
ton OF the land company literature.
Where it is possible for them to escape
the narrow alleys and tenement
houses and secure q few acres which
they may call their own, they ere set
ting down to earnest agricultural en-
deavor ard starting from the very
bottom to build 2 home in which TO
spend their later years. They are out
side the social influences which held
them to poverty by keeping up ap-
pcarances in the city. They are plac-
ing themselves near to natures heart.
and before their country neighbors
just as they arc. II they are poor, they
frankly admit it to the strangers in
their new surroundings and set about
making good. Thus they are able to
economiZe on hundreds of little ex-
penses that would seem to be abso-
lutely necessary in their old surround
ings. They have been taught the
fundamentals of economy in house
hold affairs that they might make a
more respectable outer appearance,
and this stands them in good stead in
their farm home. They live simply
and save from the start. They have
the newly awakened enthusiasm which
IS given only to those who have seen
another and less desirable side of life.
They work early and late and find
intense SdtlS1aCtlOn III DulldlnE up ana
arranging things that are to be their
very own. They feel that they are not
TO be driven out by a landlord. and
that. modest and simple as it is, this
home is their own, and if illness or
other incident interferes with the
breadwinner for a day or a weel, he
is not losing his job, or jeopardizing
the comfort of his fanily-the crops
and the stock keep on growing