Webster City freeman. [volume] (Webster City, Hamilton County, Iowa) 1884-1946, 1921-01-31
A FARM PROBLEM.

! ~
a Western woman to her congressman,
written more or less facetiOusly, re-
Gently went the rounds Of the press. 1t
suggested, as one solution Of the multi
tude of troubles which are harassing
the farmer folk, the legalization of
plural husbands. The letter set forth
what purported to be the ordinary daily
routine of the wife of an average farm
era routine which is measured not
from '.sun to sum-" hut from lamplight
to lamplight. A lengthy and formidable
list of duties was enumerated as the
daily task Of the farmers wife, and it
was suggested that in addition to the
husband who was working in the fields,
lazily riding a plow," there should be
one or possibly two husbands around
the house all day to help carry water,
split the wood, milk the cows, feed the
chickens. do the churning, help. with
the washing and make themselves gen
orally useful as well as ornamental.
In this way, the writer suggested, the
life of women on the farm would not
be always drudge--and sometimes a
horror-which usually ends in doctors
bills. undertaker's bills and either
"Wife No. 9" or a breaking up of the
farm home.
VI,S1
much sarcasm in the letter, it ,neyerthe
less touched very sore spot in rural
conditions. The waste of woman pow
or on the farm is a menace not only to
agricultural interests but it is mel
ace to the Nation. 1t is responsible. for
the double evil of driving girls to leave
the farm and thus making it difficult
to increase farm ownership and perma-
nency, but 1t is crowding our cities
with the flower of our Nations young
womanhood and adding to the social
and economic problem in every center
Of population.
President Roosevelt was the first
leader to sense this situation and its
real import. 1t was one of the pro-
blems he had in mind when he created
his Country Life Commission i'll 1905
fer the purpose of studying all the
phases Of rural life and suggesting i'm
provements. Among the most striking
parts Of that report were the almost
tragic revelations of some conditions
and lives OF women iii many farming
sections. Since then this problem has
received constantly increasing atten-
ton 1t is becoming more and more
recognized that the cure for much of
the rural unrest today can be found
only under the roof of the farmhouse.
Boys are leaving the farm because
the girls aer leaving. and the girls are
leaving because they rebel against
spending their lives doing drudgery
without any diversion or relief.
A few of the reasons why girls leave
home when that home is on farm
and statistics show that young women
are leaving the rural districts for the
cities in larger numbers than young
men-are revealed by the survey of 49,
900 farm homes in thirty-three states
of the North and RECENTLY completed
by the Department Of Agriculture IN
cooperation with the state agricultural
colleges and farm bureaus.
Mere than half Of the women inter-
viewed, although classed by the census
office with those having ''no Occupa-
ton" are up and at work by o'clock
in the morning The working day of
the average woman is lib hours the
year round and in summer it is 1872
hours. And eighty-seven out of each
one hundred women have no regular
vacation during the year.
Five additional men are required for
Mt least six weeks in the year on SO
per cent of 6.OS3 farms reporting. but
only ii per cent of the women included
in the survey reported hired help, and
that for about only three and half
months each year. Yet 81 per cent OF