CHAPTER XXIII 

 FARM MANAGEMENT 



STANDING OF THE FARMER 



Qualification. — To be a successful farmer one must 

 have as much knowledge and ability as a successful mer- 

 chant, banker, manufacturer, or any other business man. 

 Not long since it was believed that, if one were not intelli- 

 gent enough to do anything else, one could farm. This 

 belief might have been true, to some extent, many years 

 ago, when the land was newly settled, the soil was rich, and 

 there was practically no market for anything but wheat, 

 so that the chief requirements of a farmer were to plow, to 

 sow and to reap. The more able farmers were more success- 

 ful than the others, but even the careless and the thought- 

 less succeeded fairly well as long as the land was rich and 

 free. , These crude and careless methods of farming and 

 the number of farmers who used little system or good busi- 

 ness management caused farming to be regarded as a rather 

 inferior calling. 



Conditions Different. — Conditions are now very differ- 

 ent. The fertility of the soil is often somewhat depleted, 

 so that careful and well-planned systems of cropping, tillage 

 and fertilization must be employed to secure good crops. 

 The price of land has increased until one must pay from 

 $5,000.00 to $25,000.00 for a 160-acre farm that at one 

 time could be had free. The country is more thickly 

 populated, and systems of transportation are better, so 

 that nearly any product raised can be marketed. The 

 conditions tend to raise the requirements of the farmer. 

 He must be wide awake, intelligent and ever on the alert 

 for better methods of production. Thus the proper manage- 

 ment of a farm demands as high a degree of intelligence as 

 is needed in other walks of life, and we now find as strong, 

 as intelligent and as well educated men and women on the 

 farms as in town. No one is now ashamed to be called a 

 farmer. And an intelligent and successful farmer stands as 



