The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1918-09-28
THE FARMERS STRUGGLE.
As Prices Are, s2.2O Seems a Small
Price for wheat.

To THE EDITOR OF THE SuH--Sr: I
was much interested in Beacon HIS
outburst In your paper OF September 10
about non-taxpaying farmers. Like most
city folk he does not seem to know that
farmer who has $4,000 above operat-
ing expenses is a rare bird. The city
jewellers have an idea that getting $2.2o
bushel for wheat makes plutocrats of
us, but Just listen to few figures.
Three years ago labor was plentiful
down here at 81 a day; to-day 1t is
$50 day, when you can get II. Three
years ago fertilizer was sl2 to SIS a
ton last year It was $40, and this year.
thanks TO the Increased freight rates, 1t
is $50, Feed for the horses which do
the ploughing, haul the reaper and binder
and haul in the grain from the field
used to be $50 ton: to-day 1t is SO.
Oh, of course. farmers should not buy
horse feedi Well, for the most part we
don't, but the feed raised Is worth the
market price, Is 1t not? And 1t would
pay no better to raise feed at $40 n ton
than wheat at s2.20. There Is one more
absurd little item I wish to mention.
Binder Irvine, which is a monopoly Of
the Internal ional Harvester Company.
this year It is 30 cents, an advance
of 200 per cent. The result Of all those
figures Is that a farmer loses money on
wheat at $2.20 a bushel unless he has
land strong enough to produce above
twelve bushels to the acre.
There Is another picayune item. and
that Is that last year we paid at this
particular point six cents a bushel to
the railroad TO haul the grain to the
mill; this year we pay nine cents a
bushel for the Identical service.
While am writing l wish to say
something about the drafting of farm
labor. which leaves us helpless. Oh.
yes. I know. the Womans Land Army
and the public school boy. not to mem
ton the city buns whom It Is proposed
to dump on the farmer and his family.
No one seems to realize that farming
Is q highly technical profession which
cannot be learned In few summer
weeks. Ploughing, for instance. is not
a matter Of hanging on 20 the plough
handles for support and letting the
tractor or tho horse do the rest. And
after the picturesque member OF the
Noman's Land Army has run the reaper
and binder over the field, who Is to
throw the bundles OF grain up on the
wagon and place them properly so that
grain and driver both shall not be spilled
of on tho road to the barn? Who is to
build n proper hayrick. which is a diff
cult job requiring trained judgment?
But why go on? The banker or the
plumber would laugh at you II you pro-
posed to them to run their business with
public school boys and street loafers.
and it is just as funny to propose to
run a farm with them.
The old idea that the bright boy should
be sent to college, while the fool OF the
family ran the farm. still holds sway,
but the exact opposite Is the correct
view. Let the fool be sent to college,
where enough law or theology or medi-
cine can be crammed into him to make
him pass muster, and let the boy with
brains run the farm, which demands
all the brains and education any one
man can apply to it. My husband Is a
Harvard man and am a graduate Of
Smith. so I know whereof speak.
FARMERS WIFE.
GREENWOOD. Va. September IS.