No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 225 



Whom then can we call a successful farmer? He is the best 

 farmer, as he is the best citizen and the best man, who can mak'e 

 the best use of every opportunity that presents itself, who. uses 

 his brain to save his back, who is interested in and is kind and 

 heljjful to his fellow-man; who makes a cheerful home where wife 

 and children are contented and happy, enjoying to the full the many 

 good things Providence has placed within his grasp. "\Vhat things 

 are required of a sucressfiil farmer? The demands loday are varied 

 and numerous, and to prepare for them requires an education of 

 no mean type. The competition of the times and the scarcity of help 

 require that the farmer should be able to use the latest and most 

 improved machinery in all branches of farm work. Most trades 

 today are specializing, each man is doing a small part of the work 

 in any industry, but witli the farmer it is just the reverse. There 

 was a day when the mechanic in the shop was a man of varied 

 accomplishments. He could run any machine in the shop or do 

 any kind of work. Now he runs but one machine. The day was 

 when a shoemaker made shoes, now he only repairs them. The shoe 

 is made by many different hands, each doing but a small part of 

 the work on each shoe. From Monday morning till Saturday night 

 the man at the last does nothing but drive pegs until it becomes 

 second nature to him and requires no mental effort on his part, 

 but he moves like an automaton. The watchmaker once made 

 watches, cutting out every wheel, fashioning every part, and the 

 watch had some individuality, but now brass rods are fed into a 

 machine and at the other end come out wheels cut and polished, 

 ready to be assembled into a watch. Ten thousand of them, all 

 alike, interchangeable of course, therefore easy to repair. But in 

 a thousand no one could discover a difference except in the number 

 stamped on each. All character and individuality has gone not 

 only in the watch but in the watchmaker as well. The same 

 thing has happened in nearly every trade. The individual has 

 became a machine or the machine has taken his place. 



On the farm how different? While there has been a change it 

 has been in the opposite direction, to broaden the farmer's sphere 

 of action and make him a more all-round man. Fifty years ago the 

 farmer alone, or with the help of a blacksmith, could make most of 

 the tools used on the farm. The plow, harrow and plank drag, the 

 sickle, scythe ,wagon and home-made rake, and the fork and flail 

 comprised the farmer's tools. Things so simple required but little 

 skill to keep them in repair. Therefore it was supposed that any- 

 one could be a farmer, and that he needed an education. Then a 

 little scratching brought abundant crops from a virgin soil. But 

 now how changed. What knowledge and skill are required of the 

 farmer today when he must use and keep in repair disc and sulky 

 plows, patent harrows, drills and rollers, binders and threshing- 

 machines, hay elevators and silage cutters, engines which take the 

 place of an ox and horsepower and a score of other things of which 

 our grandfathers never dreamed. To successfully handle these ma- 

 chines requires a skill far surpassing that required by the so-called 

 mechanic in the shop, who onlv runs one machine or does one opera- 

 tion day after day for months and years. The farmer of today 

 must be versed in practical mechanics. When the binder breaks 



15—6—1907, 



