The Wilmington morning star., 1940-07-22
HARVARD TEACHER
IS FINE FARMER
Has Become Apostle Of scien'
tific Farming In Rocky
Hills Of Georgia
BY AL RICHARDSON

TALKING ROCK, Ca, July 21-
RAA Harvard Phi. D. who gave
up an English professorship and
turned himself loose in the woods
has become a practical apostle OF
scientific farming in the rocky, soil
depleted hills of norther Georgia.
This man of clustered culture
amazed natives by growing corn
where not even cowpeas would
grow before, turning hard clay hill
sides into loamy cotton fields, heW
logs, building himself a comfor-
table house and barns.
II had a lot of ideas l was
eager to try" reminsced DR.. E. c.
Perrow (Ph. D. Harvard, 1909.
one time professor at the univer-
sites of Wisconsin, Mississippi and
Louisville.
Many a native scoffed at the
ideas as impractical for this billy,
rock-laden country. That was 20
years ago. Today they will tell
you those ideas have proved far
from fanciful and that the college
man born in Virginia and now run
ing so is one of the best farmers
in this section.
Perrow turned his Doctor of Phil
osophy theories into a new philos-
ophy of rural life that has served
as an example to Pickens count
ians.
A tricky stomach sent him from
the classroom. "Get out in the
sticks" a physician advised. Per-
row bought 500 acres of stump
ridden hills. To them he brought
his Boston-reared, music loving
wife, two young sons and a daugh-
ter.
Perrow knew he should start his
farm with cover crops of peas
and clover to enrich the wornout
soil. But the soil wouldn't grow
peas. So he painstakingly cut ter
races and built dams to prevent
washing.
That started the "cover crops"
Now he gets between so and go
bushels of corn per acre from the
hillsides.
A terrace system carries rain
water z%ig-zagging for more than a
mile across a six-acre cornfield.
Retention trenches filled with
leaves trap rain on slopes, dole it
out later to fields below. When the
leaves rot they go into fertilizer.
Perrow mixes his own fertilizer.
"Most farmers don't know what
they are doing when they buy fer
tilizer in a sack" he said. Soil
in this vicinity has plenty Of po-
fash and needs only phosphate and
lime" Lime may be obtained cheap
in marble dust at nearby marble
quarries.
One of Perrow's original ideas
was that farmers tried to cult
ate more land than they could
handle. He still thinks so. After
20 years, he and his older son
cultivate only 80 acres b e e n
them. Less than five days work
has been hired on the farm.
The son, Carl, uses two mules.
Perrow works a horse. They turn
out ten bales of cotton on ten acres,
a high yield here. Summer and
winter they cultivate soil-building
clovers and peas, swapping from
plot to plot.
Musical-minded Mrs. P r w
keeps up with her music. She also
keeps up with 200 chickens, an Or
chard, many shrubs and household
duties. Carl rugged up a water
wheel generator to furnish electri-
city for the h~ouses.)
In addition to his farming, Per-
row has found time for the last
decade to be county surveyor. He
learned surveying as a hobby
while teaching English literature
at the University of Louisville. OF
it, he says:
Il count as part Of progress in
the art of living that several new
and better roads have followed the
trail of my transit, and that 1
have been able to make peace be-
tween more than one pair of con-
tending landowners.
All in all, Perrow admits, he
hasn't made much money. B
money has little meaning to the
scheme of self-sustaining life he
picked for himself in a long house
on the oil in the hills. q