Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1910-02-18
A RAILROAD TURNS FARMER.

We like the way the New York Cen
trail goes about it to give practical APP
plication to the cry. Back to the Soil"
This great railroad is hardly in a po-
sition to Itself move out on an eighty
or forty and add its mite to the pro-
ductive power of the country, but il is
in a position to do far more than that.
And what's best of all it has-or its
enlightened executive officers have
the will The viii is the thing that
often turns the scale up or down. 9th
or railroads and other concerns, as
well as individuals. might do what the
New York Central has set out to do if
they but had the will. That they lack.
The Central is going to run some
demonstrations" farms in the state
e New York There Will be two or
three of these 10 begin with and more
later l. is not the purpose TO do any
thing fancy 1t is intensely practical.
We have here a platform on which
the New York Central and the farmers
can stand together" says President
Brown in a brief explanation of the
scheme prosperous farmers along
our lines mean increased traffic. There
is no altruism about that. 1t simply
means that it IS good business for the
railroad to do all it can TO increase
the products of the farm and b tier
farming conditions. If the railroad. by
moderate expense and thought can
make these conditions radically better
for the farmer, it is plainly in its own
interest to do so. That is why We have
planned the three farm stations here in
New York state
In other words the plan is not, as
a New York paper puts it, for a group
of agricultural experiment stations for
spending the New York Centrars good
money on lot of salaries, high wages,
scientific tools and apparatus. chem
icals, fertilizers, irrigation plants, and
so on; it does mean farms with prac-
teal, experienced, business farmers to
operate them and to make three or
one grew before-to bring up their
potato production, for instance, from
sixty to 300 bushels per acre, and in
general to increase their productive
ness anywhere from 100 to 500 per cent
and their profits correspondingly. AS
soon as one farm has thus been built
up it will be sold. and the money will
be put into another for the same pur-
pose.
New York has some abandoned
farms-25, 900 of them, according to
statement published not long since. So
the need for this work may be a little
more palpable there than in region
doned farms hereabouts, there is the
rankest kind OF waste in loose and
unscientific seeding and cultivation and
an occasional Unconstitutional farm
thruout this and other middle western
states would no doubt hasten the day
of reform along these lines. Next to
leaving the land lie fallow is that kind
of cultivation that merely scratches it
over. Indeed, where mere cropping Is
practiced, without intelligent effort to
keep up the fertility of thes oil, and
you take a large view of it, It would
be economy to have few abandoned
farms.
The Unconstitutional farm Is in line
with the seed corn special and the
dairy Special. It Is the logical out
growth Of these. It ought to appeal to
other railroads. AS President Brown
indicates. it is good business for the
common carrier.