66 THE FOOD CRISIS AND AMERICANISM 



of wheat in his community was located. With this 

 system established, preliminary estimates would in 

 time become more accurate and valuable, as there 

 would be a positive check against them. As it is now, 

 they are of little or no value, because we have never 

 been able to know with any degree of accuracy the 

 number of bushels of any cereal produced in any par- 

 ticular year. We may find out how much has reached 

 the elevators, but there is not at present, nor has there 

 ever been, a way of knowing the amount retained upon 

 the farms for seed and home consumption, the amount 

 wasted, fed to stock, or amount sold to local mills. 

 Possibly other valuable information might be secured 

 at the same time, and means devised to secure authen- 

 tic data in regard to corn, and I feel sure that a similar 

 plan might be worked out concerning our meat, and 

 other products. The cost would be nominal, the re- 

 sults of enormous value. Incidentally, this method 

 would interfere with the cornering of the cereal mar- 

 ket and the wholesale exploitation of food stuffs. 

 Conjectures by the Department of Agriculture have 

 been very expensive. In the past, false or erroneous 

 reports in regard to crop conditions and yields have 

 induced the farmers to hurry their grain to market, 

 only to find that a little later, when the bulk of the 

 crops was in the central elevators, the reports were 

 misleading and prices advanced. 



A recent report of the Federal Trade Commission 

 throws light upon the ignorance, injustice or indiffer- 

 ence of Congressmen concerning the American farmer 

 or farming interests. In a dispatch to the Omaha 

 World-Herald dated Washington, June 29, 1918, the 



