Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1926-02-27
Hood the East with products sold far
below their real cost of production.
Through Dark DAYS

flood the East with products sold far
below their real cost of production.
Through Dark Days
For whole generation eastern
agriculture was whipped, down and
out, Nat on it's back, utterly unable to
compete and make any profit. 1t be-
came custom to talk and write
about the decline of eastern agricul-
ture, to accept as permanent it's in
ability to compete with the agricul-
ture of the West, to attempt to ex-
plain 1t on the basis of the broader,
smoother, and more fertile fields of
the West, and, in short, to give up
the battle, to give the land final
"skinning," and then let it revert to
the wild. Us.
Neither eastern nor any other agri-
culture on permanent basis could
have competed with the ruthless ex-
ploitation of the virgin fertility of
the Ohio mississippi Missouri valley
but-"this. too, shall pass away" 1t
was long, long time in passing,
from the standpoint of the eastern
farmer, but it has passed.
From now on, the East has to meet
only the normal competition of a set
tied agricultural region with the
cream Of its virgin fertility expended
in the desperate struggle to hold title
to the land. And the East, can do it.
Make no mistake as to that.
What advantages the East lacks in
the way Of boundless prairie fields
are offset by. its nearness to market
and the eYer-increasing cost OF pro-
duction in, and transportation from,
the more distant regions.
A Land of Opportunity
Tho 10 mt, NJ,
the East. The days of opportunity
for eastern agriculture are here and
now and stretch away into the future
as long as population continues to
increase and demand the products OF
the land. But eastern agriculture,
unfortunately, is in a poor position
to grasp the opportunity. 1t has been
through terrible ordeal and shows
it.
Improbable agriculture and de-
Ginning land values throughout a full
generation have left their mark.
Buildings and fences have deteriora-
ted. The soil has been robbed of its
fertility. Too often the agricultural
methods and the scale of production
are those Of the horse-and- buggy
generation.
And, most serious of all, faith in
|
low ebb that If a dollar is made
out of the land 1t usually is kept out,
instead Of being put back to build
bigger and better business for the
future. That, in itself, means ruin,
for no business can survive continue
GUS milking" without feeding"
Pioneering In An Old Land
Those farmers who see and prepare
to meet the opportunity which time
in its changes has brought to the
East find themselves virtually pion-
GERS in an old land
The tools of the first pioneers were
simple, few, and cheap, and adapted
to wrestling the necessities of life
from forest, field and stream. The
tools of the new pioneers are many,
complex. and expensive, and adapted,
instead, to producing the largest pos
sible volume per man of something to
be sold for the cash wherewith to buy
most of the requirements of our COM
pick modern civilization. For farm
ing has changed since the heyday of
the earlier eastern agriculture and
has become great productive COM
mercial enterprise instead Of merely
a mode of life. And it must be re-
organized and capitalized as such, in
order to succeed.
What Price Success?
Chief of the tools of the modern
pioneer is capital, both in the form of
machinery and in the form of fertiii-
yer and lime-machinery to increase
the productive efficiency of labor
fertilizer; and lime to overcome the
bad effects Of the lean years Of neg
lect and to bring the soil back to its
FORMER productivity.
Have faith in eastern agriculture,
organize 1t on the basis Of modern
production. capitalize it as it de-