The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1912-11-13
Keep Your Face to the Sunrise.


This article will be read by men
who have never really believed that
the time will come when Southern far
mers will quit wearing out their lands;
when scrub livestock will be the ex-
ception and not the rule; when the
cattle tick will have been eradicated
and hog cholera reduced to compare
tive homelessness; when silos and
gasoline engines and traction plows
Will be common in every rural COM
munity; when the farmhouse with
out water system and a bathroom
and good lights and neat surround
ings will be in the minority; when the
farmer who works himself and his
family all the year, living hard the
while and doing without many Of the
comforts of life. will be almost a thing
OF the past. These men will admit
that such time should be; but that It
will or can be. they cannot believe.
Always, as they think, there must be
great mass Of farmers performing
the hardest sort Of labor and receiv-
Ing very poor pay for it, doing with
out many Of the things which men
who work with equal faithfulness IN
other professions have come to regard
as necessities. Men. good men and
true. really believe this.
We do not believe it-not for one
instant. That there will always he
poor farming and poor farmers, IS
unquestionable. There is scant hone
that all Of US, or any Of us, will ever
be perfect and do the best we know
and can. This does not mean, how
ever. that all of us cannot do better
than we have been doing, and that
enough will not do better to raise the
whole standard Of farm life and make
the farming OF the future a widely
different thing from the farming OF
today.
The time will come when Southern
lands will cease to wash away and
when the old worn fields will be re-
claimed. Some day the Southern far
mer who has raZor-back hogs and
them. The one-horse farmer about
whom we hear SO much will one day
be rarity. The rural community
with bad roads. a shabby schoolhouse
and total lack Of community spir-
IT will cease to be. These things are
bound to change-not because we say
so, but because the great bulk OF
Southern farmers are men of intel
ligence and force, who are giving
their children better training than they
had. and thus preparing them to do
better work and to get more for il.
But before better things can come to
the community as whole, they must
come to the individuals who make up
the community
In every section can be found men
who are helping to bring about the
new era in Southern agriculture-mcn
who have their faces to the sunrise
whr have high ideals of farming and
| high ambitions for themselves who
are learning more about their work
who feel that their families are en-
tiGcd to more of the good things of
life than they have heretofore enjoy
ed and who are giving their best
thought and energy to the accom-
plishment of this end. In every sec
| ton, too. are men who are hindering
the progress Of their land and their
calling-mcn who will not believe
! mat there are better ways Of doing
things than the ways To which they
! have been accustomed, or that il is
possible for the great mass of farm
ers To share equally in the prosperity
OF the country with successful men
! In other lines of work.-Thc Progress
sivc Farmer.