The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1929-04-19
By ELMO SCOTT WATSON

NUE. upon Time song
writer sat him down and
NJ NM composed song about
AMb the difficulty of keep
tanA1 NJ ing 'em down on the
nn MI farm after they've seen
% ' s:ss:ss v9 s:; Ill i. par e
more accurate cOncep-
ton of real farm life than the aver
age resident of New York's famous
''Tin Pan Alley" his song did reflect
a certain condition in our national
life which has been causing concern
for a number of years. That is the
steady drift Of population from the
rural sections to urban centers and
economists have been painting dark
pictures Of what will result if this
movement from the farm to the city
. is not checked.
A somewhat brighter picture, how
ever, has recently been painted by a
man whose position puts him in close
touch with conditions throughout the
country. He is Merlin H. Aylesworth,
president of the National Broadcast
ing company, one Of the two big sys-
TENS which is providing daily enter
tainment and instruction for millions
of Americans, and in view of the i'm
p0rtance of the farm-to-city migra-
ton problem, there is considerable
significance to the statement which he
makes. He says:
The old refrain-"How're you goin'
to keep 'em down on the farm?'-was
written before the advent of radio.
For, even a decade ago, the cities
then as now the centers of education,
entertainment and similar influences
that contribute to the satisfaction and
enjoyment of life-kept their favors
well confined within their own bound
aries. The outsider who craved them
had to go to the city to enjoy them or
do without.
Today, however, thanks to radio, this
is changed. The best that the city has
in music and the drama, in art and
literature, in entertainment and infor-
nation, is available to the farm fam
lily as quickly and as fully as it is to
the city dweller. The greatest opera
and concert stars, the jazziest jazz
artists, the stars of the vaudeville and
statecraft all speak or sing or per-
form for the resident of the farm or
the country village as directly as they
do for their metropolitan audiences.
One result of this is noted in recent
census statistics covering the shift in
population, as between cities and
farms. Since the advent of radio 1t is
noted that not only has the movement
of population from the country to the
cities been checked, but that counter
movement from the cities toward the
farms is gaining impetus. In 1927, for
instance, 1.347,000 persons moved from
our cities to the country. In the same
year the drift from farm to city was
reduced by about 100000 as compared
with 1925 and 1925.
But this, in my Judgment, is only
beginning. What radio has done in the
past toward relieving the isolation and
monotony of farm life is only an index
of greater things to be done in the flu
ture.
Improved conditions of life on the
farm are not, of course, due to radio
alone. Automobiles, telephones and, to
a very large and an increasing degree,
the extension of electric facilities into
agricultural territory, have each played
important parts. They have provided
the farm dweller with comforts and
conveniences equal to those enjoyed in
the city and have definitely improved
his economic opportunities and outlook.
But in maintaining morale on the
farms. in keeping the young folks sat-
isied. in establishing contact between