Heppner gazette. [volume] (Heppner, Morrow County, Or.) 1892-1912, 1911-05-18
Diversified Farming.
BY J. GARFIELD CRAWFORD.

s@ N"'ioh "Heu H6 LOOK crooked STICK an
u began to till the soil. Upon cntivatIn
n the soil he became master OF the plant
Il and shaped them to serve his purposes
with the plow. the savage life of th
q hunter and the nomad life of The herde
n gave way to that settled agriculture
u that now yields our food supply and up
4 on which rests our modern civilization
/ The heathen Chinese has truthfully
said that the American people are
4 meat eating people. Although we may
4 not agree with the balance cf the state
ment that "the American is go barbar.
GUS; he slashes flesh with great steel
Knives; let their women go any place
and every place with them and even
stoop so low as to allow the women to
appear with them on the street." we
will have to admit that we are meat
eaters.
The great commercial world is calling
Tor the products of the soil to feed its
millions of shop workers and this call
must be answered. The mechanic, the
miner, the Office man and the shop girl
all must be fed. 1t will be years before
the rundown farms of New England
and the South will be able to supply
more than the immediate demands of
their own people, SO the job of filling
the mouths of the cities has fallen upon
the farmers of the Great Plains and the
Pacific West.
Oregon is to contribute her share i'll
she Is to prosper and bacome a great
commonwealth, and Morrow county
must be part of contributing Oregon.
In order that Morrow county may be-
come factor in this food production it |
Will be necessary for its farmers to get |
the best possible results from the soil |
Not that Morrow county farmers are not
getting all that is possible from their
soils at the present, for these farmers
are just as good as any farmers and know |
their business thoroughly, but there
never was business which failed to
progress, but what fell, and this is Just
exactly the same condition that exists
in farming.
The idea has long prevailed all oyer
the West that, 81 must make a good
crop this year to buy that homestead of
Jones's joining me, " or 81 have lust
got to get hold of Smiths place in order
to give me farm Of 2O00 acres and to
give me control of the water shed, and
square my place out" The thought
seldom occurs that 81 will improve nv
present farm by fertilizing, placing bet :
ter stock and housing my machinery"
but the farmers have been Gland mad"
and have had the desire to be masters
of vast estates, and Morrow county far
mers have been Just as progressive in
accommodating real estate as any OF their :
nelghbors. i
But the day is fast coming when the ;,
man with the small farm is to be the
man who feeds the world, because he is g
The man who will farm his land proper T
and he is the man who will raise a few Il
head of stock, have bis truck patches 60
ana small orchards and his poultry pens. q,
Land is becoming too valuable to be n
leld in vast estates and farmed in the n
hiftless manner that it now is. The 4,
of the cities is going to 20
orce the industrious man back to the n
oil and the shaping OF the political gov m
rnment will bring about policy of or
Homes for American Citizens" and ~,
hese homes are to be founded in the ~
pen country and not in the huddled-up
house. -,
Civilization like water follows the vo
curse of least resistance, and the cheap All
snds Of the West are the avenues of NJ,
scape for this overcrowding condition
the cities. The farmers of Morrow
0unty today are simply conducting ex-
erimental farmers for those who are to
'llow, and to this end they should not W
'ntent themselves by sitting down to fol-
lie one crop idea. die
Railroads have been running trains otl
p and down this continent carrying ha
and agriculture experts, tht
lowlng and preaching improved farm an
G methods; urging farmers to diversity, OF
raise more and better stock and TO the
nserve their soil. Such men as James He
Hill have seen the handwriting on exl
e wall" and are trying to fortify them an'
Ives by getting the farmers along their am
eat railroad systems to be ready to IN
ndle the fast approaching conditions. OF
lese men know better than snyone fer'
at no country can prosper unless its w, We
-mers are prosperous and can see that fea
cry dollar invested in the farmer at ma
is time will return many fold in the
srs to come. {
Morrow county is a wheat section and Gle,
emember that il was only few years a.
o when it was the third county in the
tie in wheat production, but have II y
PROV county farmers prospered like to