Barton County democrat., 1914-09-18

BY A.,C. LAUT, In The Saturday Evening
Post.
The question is not, Can Ameri-
ca raise enough food to keep the
Continental stomach going during
a prolonged and terrible European
'war2 The question is, Can she
get that food across the ocean dur
ing the war? A hundred years
ago, when Ireland starved from
a potato famine, farmers in from
tier America fed their surplus
SpudS to the hogs and let piles of
potatoes rot unused. Twenty years
ago, when India starved from a
grain failure, farmers in Kansas
burned their stacks and fed wheat
to cattle because they could not
sell grain at any price. The pro-
hlem wasn't to raise the food. 1t
o was to put it across.
Are we up against the same pro-
position today? When the Boer
. War broke out wheat rotted on
: Western prairieS for lack of cargo
! room in Atlantic liners; and in
the Boer War only one great mari
time nation became involved. In
the present war practically every
maritime nation in the world is
involved. With the war only four
days old at the time of writing, the
oelevatorS of the United States are
crammed with wheat for which
Europe would pay almost famine
prices, and which is almSot un-
buyable and unSellable, owing to
the fact that there are no ships to
carry it forward. In England, it
is alleged, is wheat for only three
weeks supply. In New York are
jammed a million bushels, and in
Chicago territory are jammed fif-
ty million bushels, all contract
wheat for delivery to Liverpool,
with never a ship to carry it for
ward along the sea lanes and
never an underwater daring to
risk the insurance even if there
were ships to risk running the
gauntlet of a sea briStling with
the cruisers of every nation in
Europe.
Uncle Sam this year has a farm
crop exceeding his widest dreams.
For the first time since the year
19OO-19O1 he will have more than
300 million bushels of wheat to
send to Europe; and even if there
had been no war, with wheat short
mRuSSia, in Roumania, inAuStria,
in France, Uncle Sam could have
counted on topnotch prices. With
all Europe in a flame he can COM
mand war and famine prices, and
he has the stuff to sell; but he
hasn't any ships to carry it for
ward. The same of oats, of bar
ley, of corn, of potatoes. When
the Crimean War broke out, in
the middle of the last century, a
successful Scotchman had just re-
turned to the Old Land from Can
ada with a moderate fortune. The
instant war was declared he pack
ed back to Canada with his nine
sons, and bought and rented every
acre he could lay hands on around
the preSent-day Toronto. On the
land he raised nothing but wheat.
He sold that wheat at from 81 to
So a buShel, clearing on some of
the fields as high as SIS an acre.
When the war closed he retired
to Scotland with fortune multi
piled by ten. With the biggest
farm crops on record in his his
tory, such an opportunity lies be-
fore Uncle Sam today-if he can
get ships to rush this huge crop
across the hostile North Atlantic.
The Worlds Neutral Ship Famine
For hundred years America
has been paying her cargo rates
to Europe in gold-gold to the
tune of 300 to 400 millions a year.
Paper payments are suspended.
When Uncle Sam sells his 1914
crop he gets payment in gold or
Europe goes hungry. Will he sue
ceed in moving this crop along the
sea lanes, which England has been
guarding for a hundred years and
Germany for twenty-five?
Of the ships calling at Atlantic
ports 81 per cent are British, be-
3 = + = = 4