The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1922-10-30
The Farm and the Farmer
BY William r. Sanborn

OF stone and steel, bird song to Jazz.
soil to sidewalks, manure spreader
to patrol wagon, sunlight to arc
hight, dogs bark to a police whistle.
dewy grass to sprinkled asphalt, =
daisy trimmed cowpath to a brick
paved alley, a pitchfork to a patrol
mans club, the Milky Way to the
White Way, the tinted glories of
| morning to an art gallery, or the gold
and purple of sunset and twilight to
movie, rooster crow to a street
car gong, and 15-hour day to an
S-hour shift"
"As a financial proposition, how
ever, farming is the greatest gamble
on earth. The able, educated. ener-
getic farmers first big gamble is with
the weather-hot, cold, welt, dry, rain
| frost, wind, snow, and hail. The city
mans feet are on the floor and a
roof over his head The farmers feet
| are in the mud and manure, his head
to the sky, and he takes it just as
it comes-he has to. He prepares a
| fine rich soil, plants carefully clean
| ed and tested seed, and then CANDLES
With grubS, cutWorms, rats, mice
gophers, ground squirrels, crows
1 blackbirds, jack rabbits, boil weevil,
grasshoppers, chinch bugs, rust, army
worms, potato beetle, Hessian fly and
the weather. Too much rain beats
down and hardens the ground, cold
rots the seed, or the plants come up
as stunted and sickly as an Armen-
ian orphan. A long wet SPELL ruins
his hay and grain. A good crop may
i promise, but long dry spell' or
few days blasting hot wind cuts the
i yield so per cent"
Worse and More of 1t.
The doctor continues by saying that
Smut and other fungi in the farmers
corn kills his cows. He CANDLES
with chicken cholera and black leg.
foot rot and boil wevil, the tool
trust and Standard OIL sore neck
horses and balky tractor. Some one
leaves a farm gate open and clover
bloat kills his best brood mare and
his prize Jersey"
NOW, then, if the crop natures and
the weather permits him to harvest it,
comes to his last and meanest gamble,
one in which he is often forced to play
4 against a stacked deck and lop-sided
dice-freight rates and strikes, full ele-
vators and car shortage, middle men
and spectators, an overloaded market
and basement prices"
In his conclusion DR.. Cogswell tells
US that the farmer takes what is Of
fered and pays what is asked" but
surely though slowly he is writing his
own emancipation, his declaration of
independence-and there's 40 millions
of him.
! Farm Products as Cash.
: Barter is replacing the use of mon
ey in various parts of Germany. also
! in Russia, owing to the depreciation
!. of the mark and ruble. In Weimar
+ board governing the agricultural
schools has fixed the tuition for the
winter term in rye, instead of in
marks. Thuringians will pay one and
one-half eentners of rye for the sem
, ester, but non-residents of the prov
ince who attend will be taxed two cen
tners.
The Saxon Thuringian Power COM
pany at Auma has announced that it
will gladly receive instead of cash 10
eggs, tire pounds of wheat flour or
a quarter of centner of potatoes for
each kilowatt hour of electricity con
sumed.
Naumberg and Braunschweig physi-
clans state that henceforth all rural
patients will be expected to pay for
medical attention in produce at its
= pre-War cost. The pre-War price OF
> bread was recently fixed by Magreburg
doctors as a basis of payment, or about
= 1000 marks.
Citrus Fruits Estimate.
: Production of citrus fruits in Florida
; for the season Of 1929 is estimated
: by the department of agriculture at
: 100000 boxes grapefruit. Taken in
! connection with the citrus output of
California we shall have bountiful
supply of oranges, lemons and grape
l fruit for another season.
: Between 100000, 900 and 5000. 000,-
: 600 pounds of cotton have been export
ed from the United States during each
Z of the past 90 years, except in 1915
r when our exports were but slightly
over 2,00G,000,000 pounds, and in 1912
! when they exceeded five billion
pounds
Of all the pests in the south one OF
the most serious is the larva, or young
of the 12-spotted cucumber beetle. the
I so-called southern corn rootworm. The
plants attacked either die outright OF
are so badly stunted as to be unproduc.
] tive. One control measure advised BY
the department of agriculture is the
0 burning over Of waste places, such as
! the borders and terraces of fields. This
: should be done in winter and on COO
!, days when the beetles seek the dead
:, grasses for protection from the cold.