The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1913-04-27
BUREAU Of RURAL
ORGANIZATION
WILL EASILY BECOME THE MOST
IMPORTANT OF THE DEPART.
MENT OF AGRICULTURE.
(By Clyde H.. Tavenner, Member OF
Congress)

Congress.)
Washington, April 26.-What Will
be easily the most important serv-
| ice now being organized by the new
secretary, David F. Houston. The
Bureau of Rural Organization is the
idea Secretary Houston brought with
him when he came from st. Louis
last month to take charge of the
department.
Through the aid of the general ed
ucation board, DR.. Houston was en-
abled to put his idea into effect al
most as soon as he arrived in Wash
ington. In a short whie the Rural
Organization Service will take its
place as one of the most important
factors in national life. DR.. Hous-
tons plan has the hearty support OF
President Wilson.
The primary purpose OF the new
service is to attack the high cost
of living And it will attack it fun
damentally. 1t will go to the farm
where the necessities of life are
produced. For one of the chief fac
tors in the high cost of living is
the fact that production has not kept
pace WIN demand.
The aim OF the new service is 10
make the farm more attractive, and
in this statement is included the
scores of reforms which economists
have been urging for rural life.
1t includes better schools, better
roads. wider distribution of agricu!-
tural technical education, more peo-
ple on farms, more intelligent farm
| ing, better marketing conditions
closer relations between producers
and consumers-in short, all OF the
activities for rural betterment now
scattered through a score of official
and semi official organizations. VIII
be concentrated in this one bureau.
The task will be tremendous
one. The work is big enough to
enlist the attention OF a whole fed
eral department. While the stated
purpose of the service is abstract,
in actual work the Bureau "will get
down to cases" 1t will teach better
rural life by actual demonstrations.
While no specific plans have yet
been made, it is expected that the
service will conduct actual model
schools in different sections of the
country. 1t may construct model
country roads for demonstration pur'
poses. By actual demonstration it
will SHOW how the rural school can
become the farm neighborhood cen-
ter where the country population can
go for entertainment, instruction and
social intercourse.
| Marketing associations will be stud e
led, and the service may organize CO.
operative marketing associations of
farmers along model lines. The
whole purpose of the work will be
TO stimulate the movement from the
cities back to the farms and to check
| the opposite movement
Success in this work would be 20
increase farm production and thus
bring down the cost of living.
1--WE are not predicting that this
work will result in reduced cost
of living" said Secretary Houston
"The cost of living is the result OF
such diverse and intricate causes that
it is impossible to predict the result
Of changing any one of them. We
only hope to do some good. We might
be getting real results and then 9TH
er circumstances might Offset all we
could do. The price of gold might
continue to decrease, for instance
We see certain needed reforms and
we are going to try to make them"
Because OF the niggardliness of the
government toward salaries of scienL-
lists ii is next to impossible for the
departments to hire men of note in
the scientific world, or to keep men
after they become eminent while in
the government service. Only occa-
sionally do such men as DIR. Harvey
w. Wiley, for instance consent to
serve the people on a government
salary, and then only through sheer
natriotic love of their work.