The Washburn times. [volume] (Washburn, Wis.) 1896-1976, 1912-01-25

Il NN~A
- half All the same, the prog
ress of vegetation on this little plot Will be
watched with keen interest, for 1T may point
the way to helping the farmers OF the future
in important respects and even may De the
means of making some of them independent.
of climate
Of course 1t is not sought to convey the I'M
preston that the present undertaking by the
United States department of agriculture at It's
most important experiment farm is the nrst
effort to make electricity useful on the farm
Public as we'll as private enterprise invaded
that field long ago and thus we find today
many farmers in various parts OF the country
developing electricity for home consumption
by means of power plants right on the prem
ises, the energy for generating being supplied
by the gasoline engines which are becoming
so common in the rural districts, or througn
the Harvesting of water power which has been
done successfully on SO many farms More
over. the electricity thus generated is not used
merely for illumination, ETC.. inside the farm
buildings Progressive farmers and dairymen
have adapted the twentieth century power to
many tasks that had formerly to be done by
human hands-as, for example, milking and
churning and feed cutting.
But Uncle Sans new venture in electric
farming pursues quite a different path. This
latest function of the magic current is not to
supplant manual labor but to assist nature.
To particularize, in popular form, it may be
explained that the idea is to have electricity
supplement sunlight in its influence upon
growing crops. The artificial warmth and
glow will be called into play as proxy for the
burning beams from the orb above on days
when there is no sunlight and in the morn
ings and evenings of the short winter days
when old Sol is working shorter hours than
in midsummer. Perhaps electricity cannot
ever be expected to prove great stimulus
to growing plants as is powerful sunlight but
preliminary experiments have proven that it
will help some and the object of Uncle Sans
present undertaking is to determine just how
much assistance electricity will render under
the conditions of soil and climate, etc., which
confront the average American farmer
The reader might naturally suppose, if he
hasn't been informed otherwise, that If Uncle
Sam was going to employ. electricity to coun-
terfeit sunbeams he would do 1T by calling
into use powerful electric lights, which seem
to be about the next best thing to sunlight.
in briliancy. Well. that was the way it was
done by several of the leading scientists of
Europe who have rather gotten ahead of us
in such tests They hung big arc lamps in
greenhouses and they heightened the growing
day for plants and vegetables by flooding the
hot houses with light for several hours after
shutdown each day The result was that one
prominent foreigner has produced splendid
strawberries in a much shorter time than
would have been possible had nature been al
lowed to take her own course and our own
Cornell university in New York state was
equally successful in hurrying the growth of
lettuce radishes and other vegetables by this
same method But Uncle Sam is not going to
follow blindly in this beaten path He is TAX
ing a new tack
The principle of Uncle Sans new electric
farm''-if we may call one miniature wheat
field FARMS to employ the electric current
itself and not the electric lamps to spur nature
in her work. This is interesting in itself and
the project will be of added value in its re-
suits from the fact that the growing under
electricity is to go on out of doors instead of
in the artificial atmosphere of hot house
Moreover, in order to approximate average
conditions the experts of Uncle Sans bureau
of plant industry have chosen as the scene
of their experiment, not a prize farm, but
tract on the largest experiment farm of the
United States department of agriculture locat-
ed near Arlington, Virginia. This land was
formerly part of the historic estate of Rob-
ert E. Lee, the Confederate general, but it was
neglected for many years after the war and
it cannot be said to offer more than average
opportunities for tilling, if they be that good
The appearance of Uncle Sans "electric
farm is well calculated to rouse the curiosity
of any chance farmer riding along the road,
even if he did not see the warning signs eau
tioning him that he must not get within four
feet OF the wires carrying current of 100000
volts-electricity powerful enough to do all
sorts Of damage if given the opportunity.
What the farmer beholds is a plowed area
dotted at intervals Of couple of rods with
slender wooden poles about seven feet in
height At one corner of the field is the so
called power house. of this farm, small
frame building from which leads wire con
nectino with the wires of a nearby interurban
trolley system If the farmer looks close he