The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-01-10
Average


''Ile average acre-Value or kaflr during
these IS years was Sc per cent greater than
the average acre-value of corn. Only
four times did corn bring more money
much as dollar an acre. In the best corn
year of all-1915-the difference was but
9S cents in favor of corn. So you see that
corn in 1917 and 1918 are II to 4. But
you keep bucking that sort of a sure
lively harmless and inexpensive pastimes
shooting craps and playing poker are
very properly. tabooed;
You persist in wasting the profits which
you make from other crops in as vain at
tempts to maintain a place in the corn belt
as the kaiser and his Huns made to get
''There seems to be wide difference of
opinion as to the cost of crop production.
acre of corn is impossible to obtain. Sure
ly $3.50 acre is low enough. for the
of be said 70 be
ting very far very rapidly. Your own
| reports show that the average acre-value
planted 69.T40.0S5 acres to corn during
these 10 years and got from the crop
of production. On the basis of the reports
of the United States bureau of crop esti-
mates, your loss on the corn crop during
only tive years in the ten did corn make
more than $3.50 an acre. Your corn crop
was actually Profitable only in 1915. when
you had the lowest acreage and got an
average return of $16.21-
During these same 10 years. the average
! acre-value of your kafir crops was $4.97
/ greater than of corn. If corn had brought
in as much money as kafir did to the acre
| Kansas farmers would be about $50 million
dollars better off han they are.
! Knock Is Praise.
ct am aware that these are fightin'
| words in Kans3s-that they must sound
strange to these walls, accustomed as they
are to unending praise of the greatness of
! this commonwealtA. But no one has offer
| ed such positive proof of the states out
cfp Fr,ff 7 afasV
| to you. No other state could waste money
las you have wasted 1t without going agri-
cultdrally busted. And the farmers of
1T is because of my interest in my own
frankly. Willie unfortunateiy the influence
| of your political example fails to reach
large Ge Extent eE ffe yo oerssf e nur
| tempts to make corn grow on the sun
| scorched hilltops, with results similar to
edwards reform. Our loss on the corn
| crops of the last 10 years has not been
as, much as. you did. We have wasted
only abont 100 million dollars since 1905
in trying to hook Oklahoma onto the corn
belt, with Kansas as the connecting link.
And we have been whiting down the corn
acreage. from about 6 million in 1909 to
3h million in 1918, thus reducing our
I'VE have been facing the facts about
corn in Oklahoma for the last eight years
|
efforts for agricultural Improvement are
! agreed that Corn should be planted only
on land where corn produced a crop last
| year, good enough for seed this year, other
| land usually put to corn being planted
| to oats, barley, kafir, milo, feterita OF
! cane.'
This program fits Kansas just as well
as it does Oklahoma and Texas 1t is the
| basis ON which farming on the plains
| may be made safe.
Evidently, you do not believe what is
| published by your board of agriculture
and agricultural colleges That the college
does not take its own results seriously
is indicated by the fact that 1t put
| big seed corn campaign in February, 1914
and made the kafir crops incidental, not.
| withstanding the fact that kafir returned
3S1 per cent more money to the acre thar
corn in 1913. But the college should no
be criticised for that Continuance Of it,
| work depends upon getting more appro
priatious and you have not yet reached tn.
point where 1t is safe for Kansas insti
tuition to admit the truth-that Kansas |.
not in the cornbelt and never will be. anC
| to proclaim the fact that Kansas is tn,
leading state in the kafirbelt
Last Session Today.
/ . The agriculturists this afternoon
| began their last session of the con-
vention. The meeting closed late thi:
afternoon with election of members t.
succeed P. H. Lambert, Hiawatha