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Missouri Agricultural Report. 



W. I. Diffenderffer. 



EUROPEAN METHODS OF FINANCING THE FARMER. 



(W. I. Diffenderffer, Lebanon, Mo.) 



The invitation extended to me by your secretary to speak 



before this meeting is considered by me 

 a personal compliment. At the same 

 time, I consider it a great privilege to 

 place before this body a brief, personal 

 report of one who was a delegate on 

 the American Commission that went 

 abroad to investigate agricultural con- 

 ditions in Eurpoe. 



I had the honor to be named by 

 United States Senator Duncan U. 

 Fletcher of Florida as a delegate at 

 large upon this commission. While 

 Missouri had no legal representative, it 

 was understood that I represented this 

 grand old State. 



You have already followed the newspaper accounts which 

 stated that the commission consisted of about seventy delegates 

 representing thirty-six states of the American Union who visited 

 eight countries of the continent. 



The purpose of this investigation was that the American 

 people might be awakened to the general and permanent pros- 

 perity of the state and the nation, a full report of which has been 

 made to Congress, which will be made public. The view ex- 

 pressed by me is my personal opinion and investigation and has 

 no reference to the report of the commission, disclaiming on 

 behalf of the commission all responsibility. 



In European countries the rural conditions differ widely 

 from those in America. The environment and temperament is 

 entirely different. There the farmer with his entire family culti- 

 vates the soil and gathers the crops. His wife, sons and daugh- 

 ters work in the field. In Germany, I believe, fifty per cent of 

 those in the fields are women at work on small tracts of intensely 

 cultivated land. 



Every farmer knows the business of his neighbor and his 

 borrowings are common knowledge. The European farmer is a 

 "fixture" on his place, which possibly his forefathers before him 

 had owned and his family expects to continue. I was on one 



