Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1918-07-13
COMMUNITY

COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT
A part of the time at the meeting ~ ~. No... ~
kota Press association yesterday was devoted to th4 i'm
.portant subject Of community development Few thing.
are more important And the reasons why the subject
Is important were well set forth by the two speakers who
devoted special attention to this subject, Hon. F. R. Mann
of Devils Lake and Alex Karr Of jamestown.
The community cannot develop properly unless ther.
exists the community spirit. And the community spirit
cannot exist unless the people have a vital interest in the
affairs of the community, and realize the existence Of
that interest. 1t is not easy for a millionaire in New
York or Chicago to develop a lively interest in the af-
fairs of a crossroads village in North Dakota which he
has never seen, and which he does not expect to sec. #
nifty his interest is bound to lie chiefly in the sa,a Of
goods, the reaping of profits on his sales, and the trans
fer OF those profits to his main exchequer, where it will
be available for the building Of monuments Of his great
ness-not at the cross-roads-but in New York or Chi
cago.
North Dakota will be-, for us long as we can foresee,
an agricultural state. One of the crying needs Of asri-
culture, here and everywhere in the United States. ia for
more people on the farms. People will live on the farm.
Willingly only so long as the opportunities to be found in
farm life are as good as those to be found elsewhere.
There must be a reasonable prospect Of satisfactory re-
turns, but that is not all. There must be opportunities
for education and for the qualification Of the social in
stincts. There must be easily accessible to the family on
the farm, not only the large market town, where business
may be transacted, but the local community center,
where neishbors can meet and mingle, to engage in the
social intercourse that keeps the mind fresh and where
there is maintained an unflagging interest in life.
Those things cannot be found within the covers Of a
mail order catalogue. They are born at home. and they
must grow amid home surroundings. For thsi- devel-
opment there is necessary the great group Of agricultu-
raj families and the smaller group Of people who are en-
gagged in supplying the wants of the people on the farm.
Such a center must be a place where people live, and
work, and prosper, where they and those on the farms
together recognize their common interest and their COM
mon obligations to each other apd to the world.
Trade is not the end Of community life. But it is
one of the things essential to its existence. II local trade
languishes, community life perishes. It would be a sad
thing If it were true that the home trading by which the
community must live were an economic impossibinty.
If that were the fact we should in time have in this coun-
try a few enormous cities, with their millions upon MIL
lions of people, with all the rest Of the country destitute
of the small town and the thriving country village. For
tunately the economic fact is directly the opposite to this
and it is possible for the great bulk Of the retail business
of the country to be done at home, or near home. to the
direct and immediate advantage of the purchaser az well
as of the seller. r5 II
The work Of community development demands the
education of our people to an appreciation Of this fact.
That this education can be given successfully has been
demonstrated in actual experience in localities where the
various elements in the population were awake to their
opportunities. 1t is for the purpose Of spreading this
work and making it both general. and intensive that the
attention Of the Press Association has been directed to
the subject at this time. The newspapers are. interested,
but not more than the merchants or the farmers. The
success Of the movement depends on the interest and ac-
tivity Of progressive mer in all groups, and when that In
terest has been properly aroused and directed, a great
work will have been done for the American people.