The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1912-07-23
RHODES HITS HARD
IN FARMERS UNION
Tells Members They Must
Blame Themselves
ARE POOR MANAGERS
Urges Organization and the Applica-
ton If Ordinary Intelligence in
Marketing Crops as a Remedy for
Conditions Complained of Now.

Conditions Complained of Now.
The Wake Farmers Union in its
meeting here yesterday heard a warm
speech from State President l.. M.
Rhodes, Of the Tennessee Union, who
rubbed 1t into the audience and old
it hat its salvation must be worked
cut by itself.
Mr.. Rhodes is a vell-fed, good
looking citizen who courts the class
les and talks cornfield English with
equal ease. He can tell you how
sunny ~savannahs burst with fairness,
yield yet no food to the man who
feeds them all, because he doesn't
know how to handle his great incre-
ment. He can coax the language,
| yank it about, make any behest Of it
drop easily into the plowboy pluper-
fects. defying the rules of grammar
n the powers that be.
The close of his speech yesterday
was pretty nearly a poem. In dry
statistics, he showed what the farmer
might do if he marketed with intel
ligence and made the demands hat
cution Of his business. But when he
entered the realm Of the imagination,
he was superb. The address vas a
song. Rhetorically it was a beauty
n sentimentally without guile.
Mr.. Rhodes was introduced by DR..
j. NJ. Templeton, president Of the
union. DR.. Templeton explained that
the meeting was called for the pur-
pose of taking stock in the Wake
warehouse, the site for which had
been donated near the S~eaboard,
Southern and Raleigh, Charlotte and
Southern. He deplored the small
audience, though it was a pretty good
49, Nv
filled and there were forty men on
the outside Of the railing. It isn't
bad to have one hundred farmers.
Placing the Blame.
Mr.. Rhodes began by saying that
those who had come out to hear him
abuse the other fellow, the specu-
lators and all those who buy from
him, would be disappointed. THE
truth is, we have been as much to
blame as anybody, in fact more.
There is no need cussing the other
man. We have been owning all the
necessities, yet the other man has
been able to market them to suit him
self.
Yes, we have been skinned, but it's
our fault. We have been skinned so
often that we don't know our own
hide when we see it hanging on the
pole. 1t reminds me Of the story a
Methodist preacher told Of a fellow
~ oil eel. W1on ne NdnkpO
it out, he started to kill it. The
preacher yelled to him not to do that.
the eel was good to eat, the hide
could be used for shoestrings. SO the
fisherman skinned the eel and threw
IT pack into the creek. And he
caught the eel again and skinned
MN, keeping this up FIVE or six wears
He caught that eel SO often that every
time the old fisherman was heard
coming, the eel crawled out to be
skinned. That's the way we farmers
have been doing. We have been GO
ing out of our way to be skinned.
Now they say that farmers haven't
got any sense. | want to tell YOU that
they have more sense than anybody
they've got all that they ever had for
they haven't used bit Of it."
Mr.. Rhodes told how the Morgans.
!, I:ockefellers and other men Of wealth
, have been able to dominate the mar
!, fet not SO much because of what thav
own, but Of what they organize and
, control. He told how the farmer IA
gradually lost his grip upon the world
t When the wealth of the nation was ?
r few billions the farmer owned more
than half. Now with a wealth
amounting to s125.O00. 00O, 900 tho
Q farmer has but $4,000, 900. 600. The
trouble is that we have never know
3 how TO organize our resources.
I'VE haven't been able to market 81
n advantage. We have been mort
eage-ridden and credit-cursed. We
mortgage 1000, 600 farms and sal1
10000 Of them annually under the
e hammer. h Dixie boy goes to his
6 daily work blowing behind a mort
gagged mule. The farmer's VIZ
leaves the home where she is ouear
and becomes the ~farmhand. while tha
e boy and girl are taken from the do,
u of the college to make the money -
pay on the mortgage. It falls due or
the fifteenth Of November. II rrne1
S be paid in cash and it conas ..
time hen hardest to meet. Il takae
just as many dollars to paw II ther
as any other time, but it IA kes morl
S produce. 01e
r Marked Progress.
But they tell US that VIC 49,