The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-08-31
BY BRUCE CATION
NEA Service Writer

Copyright. 1892. NEA Service, Inc)
CIOUX CITY, Ia, AIg. 81
- you can go in debt $4,000 in
one year to pay for the privilege
of farming these days-and you
work your head off besides"
In those words, Fred Kriege,
president of the Nebraska Farm
ers' Holiday Association, explains
why the farmers of his state are
joining the Iowa farmers in the
move to hold farm produce off
the markets until a better price
has been won.
He stood by a fence in his farm
yard as he spoke, and gestured
with one hand toward his barns,
which needed paint, and his
fences, which needed all manner
of repairs.
Look at that" he said. do
you think I keep my property that
way because 1 want to? Or be-
cause don't know any better?
I'D like to keep my place up.
But I haven't the money. Over
there is my tractor. It's ten
years old. Instead of getting a
new one this year, had to hunt
around, find spare parts where 1
could, and patch it up.
THE farmer these days is ex-
isting-he isn't living. That's why
this farm strike is going over.
We're going to stick until we
get what we want, and we'll
stick if we have to guard the roads
all winter.
Every farmer around here, al
most, feels the same way. You'll
find fellows out there on the pick
ct lines who've been up thirty-six
hours and more at a stretch; fell
lows who go home and thresh for
two days and then go out on the
road to keep the trucks from NOV
ing. And we're making new con-
verts every day.
ANY number of men whose
trucks we have stopped, and who
got good and sore about it, too, at
first, have joined us now.
And the people in Sioux City
are with us. Why, one restaurant
there in one day dished out sixty
meals to the pickets. That's the
sort Of cooperation we're begin
ming to get"
A NUMBER of fussy chickens,
N not yet fully grown, wan
dered across the farmyard, dis
cussing something querulously.
Kriege gestured at them.
Look at them" Kriege said.
mot long ago We we're paying Is
cents for baby chicks. Those chick
ems there, now-sell 'em at the
market and you'll get around 10
cents apiece for them. Oh, well,
we've had the fun of feeding
them.
you know, they say the farm
er's troubles come because he's
poor business man.
All can say is this; the man
who can buy at retail and sell at
wholesale, as the farmer does,
and still keep on living. is
business man and a damn smart
one, too"
Beyond his barn stretched the
green fields of his farm-beautiful
fields, rich-looking, fertile, deep
with grain.
I'D be better off this year if I
hadn't planted any grain at all,
but had simply put in clover to
keep down the weeds" he said.
That's what we're up against.
I'VE are losing money-good,
hard cash-on our years work. Do
you wonder we're for this farm
erS' strike?
THIS land around here, &C
i cording to every analysis
that has been made, is the best
farming land on earth. Why is
everybody broke? Why is the
countryside poverty stricken?
"God and nature didn't do it.
Man did. The country never will
recover economically unless the
farmer RECEIVERS, because farming
is the country's basic industry.
And the farmer won't recover I'M
til he finds some way of getting
for the fruits of the earth a price
that will enable him to hold his
land, keep his property in decent
condition and make little profit.