G The Bulletin. 



world's civilization today, then, are the smoke-house and the. granary; 

 and, whether we will or not, the modern Atlas is "The Man with the 

 Hoe." Good farming then will ever be the foundation on which all real 

 progress in civilization must be made. 



AGRICULTURAL ADVANTAGES IN NORTH CAROLINA. 



Location. 



The fondest hopes of the farmer may be realized right here in North 

 Carolina. New England has little to offer the man who wants to farm. 

 Forty years ago many farmers very wisely left the Old North State for 

 Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, etc., and there homesteaded 160 

 acres of land that are now worth, in many cases, more than $32,000. A 

 number of these men have sons who want to farm and can give them 

 $4,000 to $6,000 with which to purchase land and equipment. But how 

 much land can be purchased with $4,000 at $200 an acre. Few of them 

 would be content with less than 80 acres, and to purchase this, without 

 improvements, would require an outlay of $16,000. Add $4,000 for 

 necessary improvements and he will have spent $20,000 for his 80-acre 

 farm, perhaps, before he has reaped a single harvest or realized a penny 

 on his investment. It is plain, therefore, that a young man of average 

 means in the central west must be a renter if he farms at all. Farther 

 west and northwest, the climate is too cold for any but the hardiest 

 Scandinavians or north European immigrants. In the far west prices 

 are, again, too high and competition too acute for an eastern man of 

 average means. Farther south the climate is too hot and malaria is so 

 prevalent that the health of a man from this latitude would, under 

 average conditions, likely be threatened. Coming back to North Caro- 

 lina, we find here all the advantages the farmer has anywhere else in 

 the country, and the additional advantage of living in a state destined 

 to become one of the leading manufacturing states of the Union. 



Capital has not been slow to accept the invitation tacitly held out by 

 our location with reference to other states, and our strategic position 

 with reference to the future manufacturing development of the coun- 

 try. The 3,500,000 horse-power that but a few years ago was running to 

 waste along the streams of the piedmont and mountain sections of the 

 State is now being harnessed and utilized in the various manufacturing 

 and other industrial enterprises. This immense power is just on the 

 border of the cotton fields and among the forests and the mines. Our 

 climates and soils are capable of producing more than enough to sup- 

 port the largest possible mill population that will ever be needed to 

 manipulate the electric power generated by our streams. We have ample 

 facilities for transporting raw materials and for handling an unlimited 

 amount of finished products. No one is blind to our easy access to deep 

 water on the coast, the Panama Canal, and thence to the Orient. Cap- 

 ital has seen its opportunity among us and has laid the foundation for 

 its own protection and our development. 



