The people's voice. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1939-1969, 1944-11-10

the fertilizer that before the war tn,
facilities were exclusively producing
" Most important of those products is !;
J. highly concentrated phosphate fertil
L izer Phosphate is vital mineral
|, gravely needed on most of the sol
L of the south and the midwest.
Congress directed that the fertilizer
products of this plant should be made
: available to the farms of the whole
. nation not just the Tennessee Valley
. Consequently during the past decade
more than 10000 farmers in 20 states,
farmers selected by their neighbors,
, have voluntarily joined in a unique
! INSTRUMENTATION program. On their
farms-private farms-these new fer
tilizing materials have been tried out,
not on test plots or on experimental
acres, but by the farmer himself in
actual farming operations. The test
demonstration farmers have been pub
lic-spirited pioneers. On the basis of
actual experience on their farms, the
country knows today how these fer
tilizers can be used to increase food
production without exhausting the
fertility of the land; and how they
can be used to permit farmers to i'm
prove their agricultural practices and
at the same time increase their in
comes.
And let me add, as an important
aside, that the states and their farm
agencies in every one of these 30
states, without exception, have pro-
vided the local leadership and know
how for this program, under two-way
contracts with IVA.
The state and federal technicians
that the results are good. In the
Tennessee Valley we know farm in
comes have risen. The statistics,
even in pre-war years, are impressive,
but most convincing of all is the
changed look of the Tennessee Valley.
1t is green, seen from the air today,
with pastures and farm woodlands
covering once brown and eroded
fields.
There is a great deal, very great
deal yet to be done by the farmers
of the Tennessee Valley to strengthen
their land Ten years is a short time
to change farm practices and to re-
store land. But beginning has been
made.
The problem faced by IVA was |
how to make the knowledge of the
experts available to the individual |
farmer in terms of his practical prob
lens. We have regarded it as part of
TWAS responsibility to help in over
coming obstacles that hinder farmer
from so using his soil as to conserve
its vitality while it supports him and
his family.
to protect the hillsides and to add
to our natural forest wealth. We
had to find new uses for the farm
woodland, ways in which the farmers
trees could raise his income. There
have been tree crop demonstrations
by farmers throughout the valley, and
demonstrations in scientific forestry
management, Investigations in new
industrial uses of Gull timber
The minerals of a region, of any
region, are a resource, too. Their de-
velopment can make the people more !
secure. The Tennessee Valley, like
this Missouri Valley, has source of
income of great size in the minerals
buried in it's hills, especially if those
ores can be utilized in industry and
not exported as raw material. But Z,
these minerals, some fifty in number
in our region, were not well known. :.
Facts about their location, the size of !
deposits, and particularly their mod :
ern uses in industry were either not
known or were not easily available
to businessmen. In cooperation with a
state agencies and with private in t
dustries, the IVA set about the job {
of making better known the facts a
about those minerals and what they
could be made to do. AS result, b
new industrial and commercial oppor b
tunities for private business have d
been opened up, fields which grow in il
promise and practical value almost
every month. b
Now the purpose of all of this p
activity is, of course, not the develop t
nent of rivers and land and forests il
Ind minerals in themselves. What n
happens to human beings, and not to d
water or land is the ultimate con- a
,ern of the IVA That is the result C
IVA is to be judged by Unless all o
hese engineering and scientific and
achievements are real a
y aiding the people, iva would have C
allied. The beautiful dams, the green u
fields, and the factory buildings would g
lave no value. n
We know-all the statistics and in
lexes show-that the income of the Il
people has risen in these eleven a.
vears. 1t has risen more rapidly than tt
he income of the country and of most le
,ther sections of the country. Stats II
les of every kind make this perfectly h
lear. This was true before the effect W
# war production, and the trend con-
inues during the war "
The Tennessee Valley is still re- Of
ion of relatively low income, of tc
curse 1t is the RATE of increase in
am commenting on. l.
You can see the change in the rec tn
rds; you can see it even more plain W
Y as you travel over the region, al sy
lost everywhere you go. You can Ell
ee it in the copper lines strung along W
ack country roads, in the fresh paint at
n the houses those electric lines tie
erve. You can see it in new electric or