The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1939-02-02

Nearly bOO farm folkS heard
Mrs. George F. Becker, of Park
ers Prairie, Mimi, tell this
story Of her experience with
keeping farm records-and she
told it right from the platform
without any notes and with no
hesitation. Mrs. Becker Is a sis
ter Of Mrs. Leo Zehrer, Of this
community, and her article
should be Of interest to all farm
women and men.
When just a little girl always
wanted to attend business college.
This ambition was never realized,
so when my husband and started
farming Is years ago, I thought
it would be a lot of fun to keep rec
ords Of all business transactions on
the farm, little realizing at the
time, how valuable this would be to
us later on.
In my opinion the most important
piece of equipment on the farm Is
not a tractor, or a milk-machine-
but good record book. So I would
like to suggest, especially to all you
women, keep record of everything
on the farm. 1t will give you a
good opportunity to be real help
mate to your husband without ex-
pending much time and energy.
Keep record of all your income
from the sale Of dairy products,
hogs, livestock, poultry and so on.
Also keep record Of what you
use this income for, whether it be
food and clothing, gas for the fam
lily car, a new piece of machinery,
general upkeep, or whatever it hap
pens to be. Then at the end of the
year, when friend husband (some-
what discouraged perhaps) says,
Another year gone by and what
have we to show for it? We've TAX
en- in a lot of money, but where is
it?"-then get out your record
book. And there you have it, black
on white, so much for food and
clothing, so much for gas, so much
for new machinery.
Need An Inventory
Then at this time it is also a
good idea to take a general inven-
tory, such as livestock on hand.
Have you more now than at this
time last year? Perhaps not any
more, but it may be of more value.
Perhaps you have raised the aver
age butterfat production per cow
from Is to 80 pounds year, or
even better than that. Or you may
have put up new building, or i'm
proved the soil through the plant
ing of legume crops. Anything OF
that sort would add to your profits
for the year. So you see, even
though you haven't any more mon
ey-or you may even have gone in
to debt a little the past year-you
may still be ahead.
Now to go back to those record
sheets. Some of those items look
awfully big when summed up for a
whole year. Take for instance,
food and clothing. Couldn't some
thing be done to reduce that?
Couldn't more of that food be rails
ed on the farm? A little more can
ming Of meat and vegetables would
help, or the home curing Of meat,
or a few dollars invested in berry
patch. All this could cut down that
food budget.
Then there is clothing. Most of
us have clothing around home that
is not useful as it is, but the ma
terial is still good. If we are at all
handy with needle and thread, that
old coat or suit could be made in
to garment with real style, with
no other expenditure except some
of our time. That, of course,
would cut down our clothing bud
get.
Need a Washing Machine?
Now the money saved this way
could be used to buy that new
washer, or install that water sys-
tenn in our homes that we have
wanted for such a long time. With
this added labor saver in our home,
we would have more time to raise
chickens or turkeys, which, of
course, would add an additional in
come, which could be applied to-
wards reducing that Pea loan or
farm mortgage. That is only one
way in which keeping records could
increase our income.
Fewer Cows-More Profits!