Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1911-10-20

fng needs OF CONSERVATION To-Day is 10
conserve conservation. There is an
immense waste of talk and time and
crude unconstructive thought on this
subject. Too many men are crying,
'Io! Salvation lies In this direction,
or that" Too many are talking with
an Interior purpose of personal gain
in notoriety or politics. Forests,
mines and water powers claim the
principal part of the thought and at
tention when they are not the para
mount subjects of conservation we
consider. 1t is too easy to generalize
or denounce or set up impractical
standards of action by men who have
not constructive. practical thought
to offer, whereby the desired things
we might wish for may be obtained.
But here stands a great necessity,
a glaring mistake, the result of gross
ignorance on the part of the farmers
of the American nation for many
generations. They have wasted their
heritage. They are continually
wasting it. Eighty-three millions of
people are depending today for food
on the wisdom, the skill, the con-
serving good sense of 100000 of
farmers. BY another decade 100 .0O0,-
600 will face the same dependence.
The cry goes up from this vast
army of consumers against the high
cost of living. The contingencies of
the seasons, serious as they are often
times, are enough for producer and
consumer to face. But we are con-
fronted with the most serious danger
of all in the wasting of fertility, the
steady decline in the productive pow
er of our arabic lands. Here stands
the question: An increasing demand
and necessity for food and steady
decline in our lands of the power to
produce food. How long shall that
reproach to our intelligence con-
tinueg
Before that great and overwhelm-
ing necessity all other questions of
conservation pale into insignifcance.
The commissioner of agriculture
Of the state of New York asserts that
that state alone has lost $16S, 900, 900
in thirty years in the decline of farm
values. In my native county of Madi-
son in that state | can buy farms to-
day for $40 to $50 an acre that once
sold for 500 an acre. The same is
\ true OF the famous old western re-
serve in Ohio. of many sections in
Indiana, and proportionately so in
the southern portion of Illinois. Who
hath wrought this fearful destruction
Of the original productive power of
the state and nation? The farmer.
Whyg Because of his ignorance of
the principles of fertility and of the
methods that belong to intelligent
agriculture.
Until very recently the forces of
education, all under the control of
the states, have done nothing to edu-
cate the farmer to a better under
standing of his duty to himself, his
calling as farmer, and the millions
who must depend upon him for food.
The people have gone mad, so to
speak, in the pursuit and worship of
so-called higher education, and neg
iected the basic subsidiary schools
where the main body of farmers must
De trained, IL trained at all, into an
understanding of what they are
about. You know, as every man
knows, that the country district school
Is the only school where 80 per
cent of all the farmers of the land
nave received or will receive for
many years to come the schooling
they VIII get. The teachers of the
state and the political forces of the
state are solely responsible for the
character of the country school.
!here has been but little vital push
ing force among the teachers for the
upilft of the country schools. The
pohucians have given 1t the go-by
because as yet there are no votes in
as an issue. The farmers do not
DeIieve in it as vital energizing
principle in their midst for their own
enlightenment and that of their chill
oren concerning the things that make
to[ the betterment of agriculture.
10 you for moment suppose that
al OF this appalling waste of fertil-
Ns mat exists and consequent de-
uucuon of farm values, would have
N 'aAen place IL the country district
senooi had been organized to teach
ue farm children the elements of
.efuiity as science and common
.ense knew them to exist? We must
.Aen charge upon the past and pres
e system of education the respon-
s.oility for this ignorance that has
nation
ne Halter ourselves that we of the
sl,1uie west are to be saved from
suls tide Of destruction because God
sas given US soil of such marvellous
ullty. But our farmers are just
great spendthrifts of this God
s,,en heritage as were the eastern
~ 1efs. The trouble lies in our lack
49, knowledge. real helpful knowl-