220 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



PAPERS READ AND ADDRESSES DELIVERED AT THE 

 ANNUAL MEETING OF THE FARMERS' NORM AL IN- 

 STirUTE. HELD AT LANCASTER. PA.. MAY 23-26. 

 1911 



ADDKESS OF WELCOME 



By HON. FRANK B. McCIAIN. Lancaster, Pa. 



Mr. Chairman: I have come here not to make a speech as you 

 might perhaps expect. I have come here not as a teacher, but as a 

 student to listen and to learn of the great science of agriculture from 

 those competent to instruct in it. There is a little maxim which says, 

 ''He who by the plow would drive must either hold themselves or 

 drive." I have neither held nor have 1 driven, and the information 

 that I possess concerning agriculture, therefore, has not come to me 

 through holding the plow. I have, however, had some experience with 

 a certain branch of agriculture covering a great many years. I refer 

 to the cattle growing and cattle feeding industry. Eut under existing 

 market conditions, a dissertation upon that subject at this time would 

 mean, in view of the experience I have had as well as some of the 

 gentlemen sitting near me feeding cattle this winter, would be to 

 them a somewhat harrowing tale, 1 fear. 



It would be a superfluity for me to tell a body of intelligent, prac- 

 tical farmers like you that Lancaster county for a good many years 

 has enjoyed the proud distinction of occupying the place of No. 1 

 among, not only the counties of Pennsylvania, but as well the coun- 

 ties of the United States in the annual value of her farm products. 

 This has been true not so much because of the superior quality of our 

 soil, but we feel because of the superior quality of the people who 

 have tilled the soil. There are fair lands to westward which possess 

 a far richer and deeper loam than does the soil of Lancaster county. 

 It is true that their lands are not peopled so extensively as ours, but 

 it is also true that to them has not been applied the same intensive 

 application of human energy as has been applied to the soil of Lan- 

 caster county by its sturdy sons. 



One thought suggested to me — it may not be a popular thought with 

 you gentlemen and I may be entirely wrong in my surmise — but it 

 seems to me that in these days the tendency is to run too much to 

 machine farming. After all it is not the number of machines you may 

 use upon the farm, but the character of your soil which produces that 

 crop. It is the personality and the willingness to do work of the far- 

 mer. I do not mean to decry the use of these labor saving devices. 

 Many of them in use to-day are very helpful. But I contend that the 

 jinlimited use of machinery upon farms has a tendency to Instill the 



