The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1919-10-17
MEN, WOMEN
AND THINGS

A few weeks back met one Of my old
school boy friends at EufauIa on the
corner at the First National bank. A
r. Bowdon, who told me that after hav-
ing lived here more than a quarter OF
century ago he was going to California
, to live.
Now Rush" as we called him. is well
in middle life and I knew that he was
digging UP many roots in order to go
such long way to get planted again.
but his sister, Mrs. Moss, had preceded
him and had told him so much about
the wonderful climate that she at last
got his consent to turn his face west
ward,
I made a trip once to the coast, going
by the southern and returning by the
northern route. I fell under the witchery
of the rainless days and the even tenn
perature and the scenic beauty and the
hospitality of the people and came home
and had much to say about what had
seen and heard to my older brother Sam.
and he got nightly interested.
It's strange how the mere fact that a
family of your home town pulls up
stakes and crosses the Mississippi and
makes a new start somehow attaches
you to the place of their residence. 1t
was with this feeling that / reached Los
Angeles, for years before the Buford
family of Eufaula had gone west and
had made it their home. 1t was enough
to give me an interest in the growing
city.
This was more than 10 years ago, but
confess that the City of Angels made
a greater impression on me than did San
to have everything that made life at
tractive from an environmenatal stand
point. With it's head almost in the
clouds and it's feet in the sea and in the
lap of orange groves, it seemed as il
nature had lavished her best gifts on it,
and it was an ideal spot for man 70
find rest and contentment.
My brother and talked a great deal
the thought of making it his future home,
provided it was all that had said in its
favor. He was in no business and just
thinking of good place to go and
spend the balance of his days. Finally
he put it up to me to know if 1 would
be willing to make the move. 1 put it
aside because all or at least the great
| majority of my friends were on this side
of the Father of Waters and I felt too
old to begin to make new ones, 50 the
matter was dropped.
| The older I get the more I am per-
suaded that the best thing in life is ones
own loved ones of the blood and then
| friends. My life has never been nor
will be great success from the worlds
standpoint. but 1t has been SO to me,
| for God has been mighty kind to me and
all during my days has blessed me with
! friendships that have made the years
sweet to me, and this is the secret of my
happiness and makes it possible for me
| to go about my work with song in my
heart.
| These things came to me when was
saying good-by to- my boyhood friend,
whose face was toward the setting sun.
He picked out Petaulun, Cal, which
1 brides itself on being the worlds egg
basket, for it's the home of the White
Leghorn hen who is on the laying"
| job like a well regulated machine max
ing her setting" place, the largest poul-
| try center on the top of the round globe.
1t can almost be said to be a city built on
chickens.
| The cluck! the cluck! clucb of the hens
| of Petaluma have been heard around the
globe, bringing chicken fanciers and
tourists from the four corners of the
earth. Sure, there are roosters in Peta-
luna, and they have right to crow,
for the chicken industry of Sonoma
county represents an investment of more
than $50, 900; but this in itself would not
make Chanticleer greet the morning, it's
the fact that 100000 pullets and hens are
scratching for a living and incidentally
dropping 45o,ooo.ooo eggs annually. for this
was their record during 1918.
4
| l started to try and give an idea of the
noise the thousands of roosters and mill
lions of hens could make if they were all
assembled at one place and began to
crow and cluck at once, but my imagina-
tion failed me, and I will tamely say
| that it would make some barnyard music.
K Now any of you who have had to buy
hen fruit in the past few years know that
| for once it did not pay the owner to kill
the laying hen, for cougar variety
was a better money getter than the goose
who laid golden egg. In dollars and
cents one years output of eggs ran
around s2o,ooo,ooo
| And so in my minds eye I can see
friend Rush walking around this lit
tie farm and calling up the chickens to
be fed, or buy with the matches from the
incubators. 1 suppose there comes to
EVERY city man sometimes in his life a
desire to get out into the country and go
into the poultry business. If you city
dweller have so far escaped the fever
do not despair for it will get You yet;
but when it clutches you before you yield
to the call, ! advise you to try out your
hand in your backyard in a small way.
Although there is an average of 1900
hens for each producer in Sonoma coun-