The gazette-times. [volume] (Heppner, Or.) 1912-1925, 1915-03-11

~
~ from New York TO the spot
= where Chicago now is would
have involved weeks of travel and
endless discomfort. A hundred years
ago communication by letter between
these points was well-nigh un-
heard of.
Yet today the trip may be convent
emily made over night. A letter mailed
in New York this afternoon will be
delivered in Chicago tomorrow morn
ing. The telegraph will convey u
message with the loss Of only an
hour Of time. And the telephone
from any point in New York to any
point in Chicago, once the connection
is made, gives instantaneous COM
munication.
Truly in transportation and easy
mentals Of civilization-we have ac-
complished in hundred years what
We might reasonably have expected
10 accomplish In a thousand or ten
thousand years.
advancement.
And so, in medicine, in surgery, in
electricity, in scientific management
and high efficiency of business con-
duct-and in almost every industry
and every line of endeavor--the pres
ent state OF advancement could never
have been dreamed hundred years
ago-could never have been believed
fifty years ago--eould not have been
foreseen even ten years ago.
In practically every line We have
been leaping centuries and centuries
ahead within the span of a few brief
years-in practically every line ex-
cepting the one line Of endeavor upon
which all other lines OF endeavor de-
pend-in practically every line save
In the production of the necessities
from the soil.
In agriculture and horticulture,
alone, have We been content with
that slow increase in efficiency which
the years might naturally be eX-
pected TO bring-while in all of our
other lines-secondary lines though
they be--we have impatiently robbed
the future OF progress which might
have taken centuries for the natural
course Of events to bring about.
Farming Backward.
Or, to look at it In another way,
If We were still travelling in stage
coaches, had only dreamed the posi-
bility of telegraph, knew nothing
OF what electricity had in store for
us, Or Of the value of modern manu-
featuring and merchandising meth
DDS, then We could sit back and say
that farming, indeed, had made won
derful progress.
But in days of instantaneous COM
munication, highly specialized mar
ketng facilities, and the wastes and
delays OF existence reduced to min
imum, farming appears. indeed, to
have stayed in the stage coach period.
II would seem as though, during
the past hundred years, and particu-
larly the past two decades, we had
been devoting all Of our genius and
bending all Of our energy toward
bringing convenences within the
reach Of all-toward making Injuries
so cheap that none could afford to
refuse them.
While all the time the actual neces-
sites Of life, the things we eat. the
things We wear, and all those other
things which depend directly upon
the soil for their production, have
grown dearer and dearer and dearer.
The Rows OpnOrtuuity.
It is this state of things that gives
the boy Of today the biggest oppor-
tunity that any boy has ever had.
A hundred years ago 1t was the
railroads which opened up oppor
tunity to the young Vanderbilts.
Fifty years ago it was steel--steel
needed in other fast-growing lines of
industry--which opened up opportun-
ity to the young Carnegies.
Forty years ago 1t was electricity
which opened up its opportunities to
the young Edisons and Westing-
houses.
Today every 40-acre tract of land
that will bear crop is begging our
boys TO come and embrace their OPP
portunity
The kind of opportunities which
made fame and fortune for young
Vanderbilts, and young Carnegies,
and young Edisons and young West
inghouses Is not to be found in the
highly perfected industries of TODAY.