624 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



PART XL 



SOME PAPERS READ BEFORE FARMERS' 

 INSTITUTES OF IOWA. 



THE PURPOSE OF THE FARMERS" INSTITUTE. 



('has. E. Hearst before Black Haul: County Farmers' Institute. 



My intimate acquaintance with the farmers' institute of this county 

 for the last few years has led me to select this subject as a text from which 

 to deduct the good that may be accomplished by the yearly gatherings, to 

 find and point out, if possible, wherein they do good and wherein we do not 

 derive the greatest benefits from mingling together for the few days each 

 year that is occupied by the session. 



This is a day of organization. 



The smallest industries to the giant corporation are each day uniting 

 their forces to obtain results that they could not obtain in their separate 

 organization. They unite to form great trusts and syndicates that, if need 

 be, stand ready to brow beat and coerce a smaller dispenser of the same 

 wares. 



It is a day when the people of the nation are putting forth every 

 effort to obtain the best and most from what they are engaged in, our 

 railroads are expending enormous sums to straighten a small curve or 

 lower a grade whereby a very few minutes may be saved in carrying their 

 passengers and express, in delivering our mail and transporting our freight. 

 To the casual observer the results do not seem commensurate to the 

 expenditures, but they must "get there" and they will "get there" at any 

 cost. Our ocean steamers that transport our cargoes and mail from one 

 country to another, are endeavoring all the time to so unite their forces 

 that nothing can stand in their way. The nations of the world did not 

 dare to dream one hundred years ago that the time would ever come when 

 a vessel could cross the Atlantic ocean in five or six days. 



Our great manufactories are adding new machinery to their works, 

 are forming combines by which they are able to turn out the greatest 

 number of articles at the least expense. 



This enormous enterprise which has been under discussion much of 

 late among our law makers — the Panama canal enterprise. What does it 

 mean? 



