The Celina Democrat. (Celina, O. [Ohio]) 1895-1921, 1914-02-27

Inniskeen. County Louth, Ireland
In America we are trying in a more OF
less conscious effort to make the
schoolhouse the educational and social
center and the school master a com
munity leader In Ireland without any
set purpose this result is already Sc
cured. At Inniskeen in county Louth,
for example, John Quinn, the school
master, is the big man. BY virtue of
his natural qualities and by reason Of
his secretarial position in the co-opera-
tive association he is the farmers
banker, their business manager and
adviser, their agricultural expert and
temperance reformer, In fact he is
the community leader. His school
house is a social center for 10 It the
people go for cooperative association
meetings, for temperance lectures, and
for public gatherings Of all sorts.
We have been 10 County Donegal
and have seen what the cooperative
Enterprises centered at Dunglow have
done for a region which is naturally
unproductive. Under the leadership
Of Paddy Gallagher a native business
genius, cooperation has brought com
fort, relative prosperity and hopeful
ness to a community which was previ-
ously a desolate combination Of peet
bog and rocky hillside.
We have stopped here to see the re-
suits of cooperation when planted in
a more fertile productive soil, for this
portion OF County Louth would com
pare favorably with the richest
stretches of our own middle western
states
The Average Irish Farmer.
Anxious to find the average small
farmer who is a member OF the coop
eratiye society and willing to talk
about It's affairs, we we're directed to
Edward Meeghan, who operated a
farm out two Irish miles from the vii
lage. AS we walked out TO Meeghans
place the consciousness was forced
upon us that IN this section Ireland is
far from being Starving Ireland" The
fields are carefully cultivated-culti-
waited as they seldom are in the states.
The hedges and walls are we'll kept
The heavy crops indicate high de-
gree of fertility. Each cottage gives
evidence Of prosperity and self-respect-
ing pride. Upon the faces Of those
whom we meet we see nothing TO indi-
cate that the local Irish are poverty
stricken or despairing. We find Meeg-
han on a 40-acre farm of which he is
evidently and justly proud. The fer
tile fields, the stacks Of rich grain, the
high grade live stock, all demonstrate
that it is possible to make money
hereabouts and that there is a promis- !
ing future IN the local agricultural sit .
uatlon.
Buying Farms for Less Than Rent.
Meeghan himself vigorous fellow, |
fun Of enthusiasm and hopefulness, ex-
plains that his father prior to his |
death had bought the land under the |
Imperial land tenure act providing for |
an arbitrated value as between land |
lord and tenant. The value once fixed |
the government pays for the land, and
then permits the tenant who becomes |
& purchaser to repay the purchase price |
IN sixty odd years, each year keeping |
up the interest at two and three. |
fourths per cent and paying in addi- |
ton a small installment upon the |
principal. He tells how his father paid, |
rs rent alone, 18 pounds per year, |
while he himself in buying the farm is |
aow paying, including both interest |
and annual installments on principal |
only IA pounds per year. Quite nat
urally he has keen appreciation of .
the land tenure laws which enabled |
him gradually to obtain the farm by .
the payment Of less money each year
than originally went for rent alone.
Prevented Improvements.
This is not to him the important
thing, however. His father had pre-
viously been a tenant A new thatch
on the barn, new slate on the roof,
or new shed for the COW, could not
be obtained in any way from the land
lord. 1t must be contributed by the
tenant, who knew that within thirty
days thereafter he might be put of the
place. The natural result was to pre-
vent all repairs and all permanent I'M
provements. In this entire region we
have not been able to discover a sin
gle fruit tree that had been planted
prior to the acquisition of the land by |
the tenant purchasers. In fact there
are no mature fruit trees here. Where
we have seen new farm building or +
any permanent repairs on old build
ings or any other farm improvement |
inquiry invariably has revealed that It
had been added since the farm went
into the hands Of a purcasing tenant. !
In other words, Meeghan and other
tenant purchasers feel now that in |
making repairs or improvements they
are working for themselves, adding
value to their own property, where for
merly any improvements made were
for the benefit Of the landlord for
whom they had no particular liking.
Farmers Views on Cooperation.
We asked him what he thought of
the cooperative society and what use