The Nevada County picayune. (Prescott, Ark.) 190?-current, 1910-09-09
EDUCATE THE FARMERS BOY
Every AgricuIturist Should Send His
Son to College and Attend Short
Courses Himself.

Farming Is a business-just as any
other occupation. Yet, 1t Is the most
negligently conducted of all
The average farmer is one because
his father was or because his lot made
| him one. And his son will probably
| be farmer, too because he knows
| more about farming than anything
! else. Yet unless this boy has caught
the true spirit of the farm and loves
of the life that throbs In everything
around him-he cannot make a sue
cess and will farm simply to make a
living
The love of farming is peculiar only
to the best farmers-the ones who
love and understand their work No
man can succeed at any work he does
not love. The farmer who does not
love his work, who does not love his
stock. his crops, his very home, Is not
likely to make the success that the
man who does love his work will
make.
No class OF work requires a higher
grade OF training or special qualifica-
tons than farming
The southern farmer has been
sleeping upon his oars. The fish have
been striking all around. He has been
batting the hook and the other fellow
has been doing the '''stringing."
The cry of back to the farm" is
yelled the loudest by those who have
an AK to grind. 1t Is usually the rail
road president who notices decreased
tonnage. or the real estate man, who
has farms for sale.
The restoration of rural life depends
upon the farmers themselves. They
alone must solve the problem and
upon them depends the saving of the
rural south to the white race.
The cotton crop of the south is made
by the "one-horse" farmer, the little
fellow In the fork of the creek the
little fellow who drives a mouse-col-
ored mule for which he paid an ex-
orbitant price, to cheap pillow chat
cost him dearly; the little fellow who
actually plows the ground, plants the
oOOut SuAliNulC tho tiop anu piSho ~
with the aid of his blue eyed babies
and wife. He Is the backbone of the
south.
II the world depends upon the big
cotton plantation owners for cotton II
would go almost naked. Thev are
planters only In name They hold and
control thousands of acres, but they
sublet their lands to ignorant negroes
and sap living from these.
The greatest curse of the south to
day is its big plantations and the sub
letting of these lands to negro tenants.
white race.
There is a certain farmer in Chester
county, Tenn. land there are thou
sands like HIM who owns little farm
of 60 acres. 1t is jewel. He lives
upon 1t; buys nothing save sugar, salt.
coffee. clothes, and farm implements
and tools Yet his dear little home Is
entirely surrounded by negro share
troopers, and his closest white neigh
Dor Is eight miles away. He fears to
leave his wife at home in the day
time and is afraid to send his little
girls to the country school. He is pros
porous enough to send them to col
lege, but hates to take them from their
mother, who would be all alone dur
ing the long, long day. He has every
thing on his farm to make life attract
I've, music books. etc, except decent
companionship.
Oh the pity of such cases!
And yet there Is solution to these
terrible problem5 that face the south
ern farmers. 1t cannot be worked by
the back to the farm" cries. 1t can
be worked only by the farmers them
selves
The beginning point must be with
our boys and girls. Just so long as
they have to gaze upon black cotton
stalks all fall. winter and spring just
so long as they must live in isolation
and be denied the pleasures OF com
partnership. just so long as they must
sit in uncomfortable rural schools and
be taught by teachers who know little
more than themselves-just so long
will they want to leave the farms and
seek the crowded cities and towns
with their glamour of life,
1t cannot be denied Except dishon-
estly) that city life is pleasanter than
country life in the south
1t is easy enough for glib-tongued
writer's TO dream of the limpid
streams, the songs of birds, the smell
of new.turned earth and the whistle of
the barefoot boy In the field. But the
limpid streams are far. far fewer than
stagnant bayous, and baked fields and
red gullies are In greater evidence
than the new-turned earth. Tired, worn
out. disconnected boys are far more
numerous than the whistling kind.