The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1912-05-22
SOME WONDERSO OF THE WEST
MACHINES THAT Pillow, PLANT
AND REAP ON THE FARMS.
Tho Horse and the Mule and the
Man With the Hoe Are Rap
idly Passing Away.

Man With the noe AAC AsNP
idly Passing Away.
Abont the Invest thing today IS
the forward movement for backward
farmers. 1t is the age of the agrl-
cultural school and the scientifically
trained farmer. The horse and the
mule and the man with the hoe
are passing rapidly away, at least
an the vast fertile areas of the west.
Machinery now plows the Iand'
nIants the seed and reaps the mar
vest. Within the last few years farm
ers in the west have been harnesslng
streams on the farms. Electricity
is one of the new hired men. Gaso-
line is another. One or the other OF
them now milks the cows, cuts the
hav and fodder, pumps the water,
seDarates and churns the milk, turns
the grindstone and does all the 9TH
er drudgery on the place. Big trac-
ton engines, like highly magniled
automobiles, till the soil and take
the harvest to market
There are about 100000 farmers
in the United States who annuity
plow an area equal to all the states
east of Mississippi and north or the
Ohio. A solitary plowman and MS
horses would have to walk eight and
one-uuarter miles to pillow an acre OF
of tho mechanical
blows. at present in use, turn In as
many as 40 burrows at once and COW
er from rs to 80 acres a day, and 1t
only takes two men to manage one
of these big monsters. Unlike the
horse the engine never tires. In Can
ada, where the seasons are short,
they run these huge plowS night and
day.
A traction engine draws the great
clod crushers that follow the ploWs.
A tractor hauls the rank of seeders
that plant the grain at the rate or
40 or so acres day. In the mar
vest fields reaperS are attached to
each engine and cut from 200 to 22O
acres a day. The threshing is done
with one traction engine and another
is used to haul a train of from eight
to ten wagons to town. More than
1000 bushels are transported in this
way at a single trip. These tractors
have road speed of about two and
half miles an hour, or about the
ordinary walking speed of team OF
horses.
A train of five huge harvesters in
tow of a tractor cutting through
field of standing wheat is an impress
sive sight. They are arranged in
sort of diagonal tandem. A bell cord
connects them with the engine, so
that if one of the machines is dis
abIed the signal can be given in-
stantly to the engineer. At this sig
nal the hitching up of the harVesters
is so adjusted that the machine next
in order takes up the cut of the dis
abled machine, and the line moves
forward without losing any time,
though with a diminished swath.
When the machine that is out of or
der is repaired it is coupled on again
and the work goes forward as be-
fore. During the rush season these
huge reaping machines work night
and day They are fitted with great
headlights and the men work in
shifts of eight hours each.
Motors of myriad kinds are doing
the work of the farmer and the farm
ers wife. They load hay, they shear
sheep, they drill wells, they run
spray pumps to protect fruit trees,
they carry water and they saw wood.
We are entering on new period
of AGRICULTURAL prosperity. A mil
lion farms have been created in the
last decade and our farm products
have more than doubled, but con-
sumption is rapidly overtaking pro-
duction. Our agricultural exports
are already falling off, due to the
increased home demand. The wide
adoption of labor and time saving
machinery by cheapening cost and
increasing efficiency on the farms
has so far prevented scarcity. But
our non-productive population is in
creasing rapidly and American agri-
culture must develop enormously
still further along new lines if it is
to save the nation from hunger, or
at any rate crushingly high prices.