The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1914-06-11
HILL ON PRODUCTION.
Great Railroad Man Sees Little Hope
of Farmers of America Raising
Enough for Our People.

Writing for the Chicago Tribune,
J. j. Hill, the great railroad magnate
of the northwest, discusses future
farm production, as follows:
"Our population has increased at a
ratio that if continued will give us
more than 200,00G,0O0 by 1850. 1t
may be 1858, or it may be l947, but
in or about the middle of this CEN
fury we shall have 200, 900 peo-
pie to feed. We are raising today in
the United States about ESQ 100000
bushels of wheat per annum. Six and
a half to seven bushels per capita for
bread and seed is a moderate and
conservative figure. With 200 ,0OO,-
600 people consuming six and half
bushels each it will require 1900
100000 bushels to feed them. This
is twice the quantity we are raising
today, and if we have no new land to
turn to where will the bread come
from to feed these 200, 100000?
1t is said that everything will take
care of itself; it always has and it
always will. But good providence
takes best care of those who take
care of themselves.
q
cultivation to raise the per capita of
six and a half bushels for 100000
600 people Let us agree that by
better cultivation the yield can be
raised so as to obtain total crop of
100000 bushels. That would be
nearly a SO per cent increase. TO
get a so per cent increase in England
required more than thirty years.
Now, with 900,000,0O0 bushels fur
nished at home and 400, 100000
bushels to buy, what would be have
to pay for it? Where would we get
it? Where in the world is there
surplus of 400,0OO,O0O bushels? In
the past we furnished the great sur
plus. Canada is now rapidly coming
along by the side of us and so is
Argentina. But by the way people
are moving to the Canadian North
west it will not be long before they
need 100000 bushels for their
own use. They may be able to sell
$50, 100000 or even 2OO,O0O,O0O
and they are close to our markets,
but all they could give would not fur
nish us with the 100000 we must
have.
Then, what will we have to pay
for it? l think it is not rash state
ment to say that if we had to step
into the markets of the world and
buy 100000 bushels we would
have to pay $3.50 a bushel or per-
haps more.
And where would we get this
to buy this with? From the
proceeds of what we send out, our eX-
ports? Exports of what? A few
years more and our iron will be gone,
or if it is not all gone it will cost so
much more than the iron Of other
countries that people would not buy
it from us. We cannot pay for this
needed food through manufactures.
If we paid cash it would have to be
gold, and we haven't enough gold to
pay $500, 100000 year or $780,
00O,O O0 or $400,OO0,O0O for any
length of time
II am not entirely discouraged
about the future of the United States.
Necessity is a great teacher, and !
have the greatest confidence that
when the people realize the necessity
it will point toward way, and from
the experience they have had in the
past they will learn to find it.
The United States has been able
easily to take care of the great in
crease of population in the past be-
cause it had vast area of unoccu
pied land This was the main asset
in it's natural inheritance. Within
practically the last half of the last
century the whole country from the
Mississippi river to the Rocky Noun
tains was occupied. No pressure of
population could make itself severely
felt when it might be turned loose in
such an empire. In those fifty years
there were added 547,640.932 acres
to the agricultural area, and the in
crease in the actually improved acre
age was nearly 800 per cent. This is
cut off from the list of our resources.