THE COMING PROFESSION FOR BOYS
In order that as little as possible may seem to be taken for granted
or as mere expressions of the opinions of the author, we cite the
views of specialists as to the possibilities of this field, so new
in this country, of intensive agriculture.
These will show that the conviction has become general that, as
workers, as teachers, and as discoverers, there is no career more
inviting or more lucrative or more dignified than that of the
skillful foster-father of plants.
"Children brought up in city tenements tend to become vicious and
sickly, but if transported to country homes they may grow up strong
and self-respecting men and women.
"There are hundreds of applicants for every position in the cities,
and competition forces the pay down to the lowest level. Living
expenses are heavier. The risk to health from sedentary occupations,
long hours in ill-ventilated offices, stores, and workshops is
serious.
"There are few inducements to out-door exercise. Even if he lives at
home, the boy who is forced to the street or into the factory before
he has the strength or education to do good work remains an
unskilled worker all his life.
"Manufacturing is upon a larger and larger scale. The division of
labor is greater and greater. Not only does the gulf between
capitalist and laborer widen, but with it the gulf between skilled
and unskilled labor." ("What Shall Our Boys Do for a Living?"
Charles F. Wingate.)
It is the city that breeds or attracts most of the pauperism and
crime. The country has its own healthy life.
Every one is born with some natural gift, and it is a good thing to
discover early in life what one's natural gifts are so that each may
be educated in the direction suited to natural capacity.
How are you to treat a lad who has naturally an inclination for the
work on the farm? In the first place do not provide him with any
spending money unless he earns it. The prime thing necessary is to
give the boy a personal interest in what is going on upon the farm.
Give him a plot of land as his own, let him understand that anything
he may grow upon this land shall belong to him, but do not give him
this plot and say, "There, take that; do as you like with it," he
will wonder what to do with it. He will need somebody to help him by
teaching him what he is to do. Enter into a partnership with him at
the start, give him some instruction as to what it is best for him
to do with his plot. Find out his inclinations; give him sympathy
and help. Bring out his natural aptitude for farming life, teach him
method in his work; teach him to think his way out; and, best of
all, teach him to work for definite results; that is what is wanted
in any line of life, especially in farm life.
Let the work of the boy have a meaning and a purpose. Let him
understand that certain results cannot be accomplished in any other
way, and give him chances to go outside and see what other people
are doing. Let him see good scientific agriculture and be encouraged
to pursue such methods.
Provide for him the very best reading that can be found in
agricultural journals and books. Let him have three or four years at
an agricultural college. All the influences there point to
agriculture as the best calling for a young man who is fit for it,
whereas in other colleges the influences are all in the opposite
direction. At our agricultural colleges a youth has all the
necessary advantages of general education, and also an education in
the lines fitting him especially for the calling he has selected.
(United States Department of Agriculture, Bulletin 138, condensed.)
"Among farmers and gardeners not enough thought is given to the whys
and wherefores, or cause and effect; as a rule, they go on year
after year without profiting by the personal opportunity afforded
them of observation, or by the results of experiments at scientific
stations.
"With rare exceptions the young farmer and gardener takes up his
work, not from the scientific side, but strictly from the labor
side; and he begins at the bottom, meeting the same difficulties as
did his father and too often not acquiring information beyond what
his father possessed.
"This should not be; agriculture should be taught in all our public
schools in country districts, as it has been taught for years in
Germany and Austria. It should be elevated as an art; in its higher
estate it is already an art. No pursuit possesses a greater scope
for development; the field is almost unoccupied by leaders,
scientific and practical." (Burnett Landreth, in _999 Queries and
Answers._)
In accordance with these ideas, the Baron de Hirsch Agricultural
School at Woodbine, New Jersey, is giving practical courses in
agriculture to Jewish boys, on the principle of individual
plots--all free where necessary.
The trustees of the State Agricultural College of New Jersey, at New
Brunswick, have established winter courses in agriculture, open to
all residents of New Jersey over sixteen years of age. Courses will
be for twelve weeks, and only a small entrance fee is required; few
books will be needed.
Other states are doing likewise; all will need many teachers and
experimenters. At present all who know anything about intensive
agriculture are snapped up by the numerous government experiment
stations at good salaries. The land like that of the Rockefellers,
the Paynes, the Cuttings, on which farming is carried on by
unnecessarily expensive methods, needs the services of trained
agriculturists and professional foresters. The Division of Forestry
at the start employed eleven persons, but now it has in the field as
many hundreds of employees, including a lot of trained foresters.
The railroads also see the profit in teaching farming, and are
devoting more and more money to experiments and lectures to show the
farmers that they can get more and better crops with the same effort
by intelligent selection of seeds.
The Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railway Company ran its first
Seed and Soil Special over the entire system in the winter of
1904-1905, and has lectured to hundreds of thousands of farmers
since.
They report to us that "there is no doubt that the lectures did a
great deal of good, and necessarily the larger increase of crops
which followed is due to the scientific methods of farming expounded
by the various professors." The late President James J. Hill wrote
much about the small farms' large yields.
The hundreds of thousands of "war gardens" unskillfully conducted
and glutting the local markets with crops all matured at about the
same local time will unreasonably disgust many with intensive
cultivation, especially those who work but do not think. The remedy
is more instruction. The effect the agricultural colleges and
experiment stations is plain to the eye in the better appearance of
farms as we near the centers of instruction.
Some years ago a clergyman published a book upon the Adirondacks; it
was full of poetry, and he sent men up there who afterwards became
known as "Murray's Fools." They knew nothing about the life and had
no suitability and little preparation for it. We do not wish to
bring out a crop of "Three Acres and Liberty Fools." We are telling
what has been done and what can be done again. It does not follow
that every man can or will do it, much less teach it or advance the
art, but the field is a large one and holds out great promise to
those who persevere and excel in it.
If any one thinks that the profit of the earth will come to the
cultivator without very intelligent and steady work, he is mistaken.
No owner of land, unless others require it to live upon, can make
money by neglecting it.
Says _Maxwell's Talisman:_ "The greatest good that can be done to
the American farmer to-day is to teach him to make the greatest
possible profit from the smallest tract of land from which a family
can be supported in comfort. A great influence operating to-day
against keeping the boys in the country is that the boy does not
have money enough to buy a farm. It is unfortunately true that in
some places there is a trend in the direction of absorbing farms
into still larger farms with a consequent diminution of population,
as in Iowa and other sections. The remedy for this is to demonstrate
that if the value is in the boy rather than in the farm, and the boy
is taught intensive, diversified, scientific farming, a good living
with a surplus profit that will provide amply for old age, may be
made from a comparatively small tract of land. The tract may be,
say, ten acres, with ample cultivation, irrigation, and
fertilization, or even without irrigation because a hoe and a
cultivator in the hands of a scientific farmer may bring as good and
better results in providing moisture for growing plants as can be
had from a ditch and unlimited water in the hands of an ignorant
farmer."
The field of discovery is always limitless, and it is to those boys
or girls who devote their attention to this that the greatest return
will come. "What a fine thing it would be to find even one plant
free from rust in the midst of a rusted field. It would mean a
rust-resistant plant. Its off-spring would probably be also rust
resistant. If you should ever find such a plant, be sure to save its
seed and plant in a plot by itself. The next year again save seed
from those plants least rusted. Possibly you can develop a rust
proof race of wheat! Keep your eyes open." ("Agriculture for
Beginners," by Burkett, Stevens, and Hill, pages 76-78.) So you may
pluck gain out of loss.
If you want to do experiments, the influence of ether on plants is
one new and wonderful field. It seems to induce artificial rest, so
that lilacs, for instance, can be made to bloom twice by a
treatment, the last time near Christmas.
E. V. Wilcox says in _Farming_ that in 1899 a small quantity of
durum or macaroni wheat was introduced into this country for trial.
It was found profitable in localities where there was too little
rain for ordinary wheat. Six years later, 20,000,000 bushels per
year of the wheat was grown in the United States. Its production has
increased greatly every season and has added materially to the total
of the wheat crop.. Thorough fall cultivation has been found to
increase the yield, and in some parts of the wheat belt one in five
of the farmers has already adopted the practice. In certain states
where manuring has been thought unnecessary, experiments have
demonstrated that the yield may be increased 60 per cent by this
simple practice. The wheat production of Nebraska was increased more
than 10,000,000 bushels by the introduction of a hardy strain of
Turkey red wheat. Swedish select oats in Wisconsin have greatly
augmented the oat yield of the state. In 1899 six pounds of the seed
was brought to the state and from this small beginning a crop of
9,000,000 bushels was harvested five years later.
"Mr. Gideon, of Minnesota, planted many apple seeds, and from them
all raised one tree that was very fruitful, finely flavored, and
able to withstand the cold Minnesota winter. This tree he multiplied
by grafts and named it the Wealthy apple. It is said that in this
one apple he benefited the world to the value of more than one
million dollars. You must not let any valuable bud or seed variant
be lost." ("Agriculture for Beginners," page 61.)
"This fact ought to be very helpful to us next year when planting
corn. We should plant seed secured only from stalks that produced
the most corn. If we follow this plan year by year, each acre of
land will be made to produce more kernels and hence a larger crop of
corn, and yet no more expense will be required to raise the crop."
(Same, page 71.)
_The World's Work_ tells how the country got a new industry.
Mr. George Gibbs, of Clearbrook, Wash., has made his "stake" by
growing tulip and hyacinth bulbs. He had a little place on Orcas
Island, in Puget Sound. He did not know anything about growing
flowers, but he did know that certain varieties of bulbs brought
good prices in the East. He was observant enough to see that the
moist, warm, climate and rich soil of the Puget Sound country were
peculiarly favorable to flowers.
He had bad luck with his bulbs; that only meant that he still had
something to learn. He kept his nerve even when he went bankrupt.
His friends told him he was wasting time, but they could not shake
his faith.
In twelve years he found that he was right. His wonderful gardens
were making him rich. Other men have gone into the business, but he
was first and has kept his lead. He has made the Puget Sound country
the greatest rival of Holland in the sale of flowering bulbs.
Quantities of wild herbs, fruits, and roots that no one eats are
good; the Jesuits had a list of over two hundred kinds that the
Indians ate, but it was lost. Some one can do a great service by
making it up again by research and experiment. Thousands more of the
wild things must be good for dyes, fabrics, and fodder.
Fame like Burbank's and fortune awaits the one who is a good
self-advertiser and can find the use of the poetic daisies,
goldenrod, and thistle, the all-pervading "pusley," and such other
vegetable vermin.
An interesting experiment is conducted in growing tea with colored
child labor, at Tea, South Carolina, by the aid of education and
machinery and the cooperation of the Agricultural Department at
Washington, who will furnish particulars. Whatever may be its
outcome, this will give an opening to some intelligent cultivators,
and it points the way to other fields.
Those who are first in raising new or improved plants find a waiting
market for them.
_The Market Growers Gazette,_ of London, England, reports that Mr.
A. Findlay, Mairsland, Auchtermuchty, Scotland, sold one season to
five leading growers whose names are given five seed potatoes at
L 20 each (which would be, perhaps, $500 a peck). He says
enthusiastically: "It is as perfectly round-shaped a potato as can
be imagined. There is a slight dash of pink on the outer rim of the
eye. My stock of it is very small, only 126 lb. and I do not care to
sell any. If next year's crop yields as well as this year's, we
shall have twenty times that quantity." Mr. Findlay has other seed
potatoes, just as high priced, for which he wants $125 per lb.,
which, he says, "means that I do not want to sell any."
This shows what progressive people think of the real value of good
seed.
It is worth mentioning that "The land on which these are grown is
not highly manured; the only artificial manure that it has received
is about 200 lb. of potash per acre. It has the drawback of being
rather stony."
Of course this is "a fad"; it is doubtful if it will pay any one to
give such prices for seed except to sell to some bigger fool than
himself. Of course, also, the market for a particular fancy thing
may soon be overstocked, but it seems to be a nice thing for the
Findlays meanwhile, and it does good in teaching people to
appreciate good things.
Yet the average potato patcher prudently saves his small potatoes
for next year's seed, which is just as if a breeder were to keep the
colts that were too poor to sell, to be the parents of his herd.
In the dark ages of farming--to wit, in 1881, for this is a true
story--a minister of the Gospel came into possession, by
inheritance, of a fifteen-acre farm a short way from Philadelphia.
He found the soil a reddish, somewhat gravelly clay, and so worn out
from years of cropping that it did not support two cows and a horse.
City born and bred, he was encumbered with no knowledge of
agriculture which had to be unlearned. He began a careful and
systematic study of the agricultural literature, and ultimately
developed a novel system of dairy farming to which he adhered
religiously.
The farm Iying near the city is high-priced land; for this reason,
and because of the limited acreage, the cows were kept in the barn
the year round. For six years his bill for veterinary services was
$1.50, while the income from the milk of his seventeen cows was
about $2400 a year. In addition, from four to six head of young
cattle were sold annually, netting about $500 a year. As the stock
on the farm was stall fed every particle of plant food contained in
the stable manure, liquid as well as solid, was utilized. No
fertilizer was ever purchased. Yet all of the "roughage" for thirty
head of stock was raised on the thirteen acres of available soil.
Only $625 a year was expended for concentrated feeding stuffs. The
net earnings of the farm for the period averaged more than $1000 a
year. And this was during the early days of his experience; later he
made more.
Professor W. J. Spillman, of the Agricultural Department, visited
him in 1903, and studied the methods employed. Then, he says, the
rush to see the farm became so great that the owner had to give it
up.
Few people who know nothing about it, and won't learn, can take even
three acres and make anything off it. To get the phenomenal yields
takes capital--sometimes large capital, wisely spent. Sometimes we
read of immense products "per acre"; this often means the product of
a single rod of ground, this gives at the rate of so much "per
acre," or might, if extended.
But any one can take a little bit of ground and use it thoroughly
and increase his borders and his knowledge as he goes on. He will
find plenty to pay him for doing or teaching whatever he has learned
to do that no one else has done "If a man make but a mousetrap
better than his fellows, though he makes his tent in the wilderness,
the world will beat a path to his door."
The mission of this book is accomplished if it interests you to
consider the possibilities of making a living on a few acres and
leads you to investigate. It is not written as a textbook, for, as
has been shown, there are authorities enough cited to supply all the
technical information needed.
Its sole object is to show what has been done and what can be done
on small areas and to show that life in the country need not be so
laborious if the same methods are used which make successes of
business in other lines.
If it does this and is the means of checking in any degree the
reckless trend of people from the country to the cities, the author
will feel that his efforts have been well repaid.