The Farm City and the Garden City 



reliance for cash income. So low as from two to five 

 acres will support a family in comfortable circum- 

 stances, if they know how to do it. This unit is com- 

 mon in Holland, Denmark, and France. There are 

 many such "pocket-handkerchief" farms in Utah and 

 California ; and there are "one-acre farmers" who have 

 done well. Usually they specialize on a very restricted 

 line of products for market, while raising a variety of 

 things for home consumption. 



Prince Kropotkin has written convincingly along 

 this line, as have others. But Bolton Hall, with his 

 "Three Acres and Liberty" and "A Little Land and a 

 Living," is the thinker and teacher to whom I am most 

 deeply indebted for faith and inspiration in this line 

 of work. Many a smiling garden, and many a humble 

 roof, trace back to the study of this scholarly man 

 and lover of the race. How far his influence has gone 

 no man can say. 



It is quite possible, however, to preserve nearly all 

 the attractive features of the home-in-a-garden system, 

 where the holding reaches from ten to forty acres ; and 

 it seems probable that these are the figures which will 

 be most generally adopted, in the United States at 

 least, during the next decade. But that will by no 

 means mark the end of the evolution of forms of coun- 

 try life which aim to raise the standard of living to the 

 highest levels. 



It is probable that future development will proceed 

 along two well-marked and divergent lines. In one line 

 the social and spiritual considerations will be sub- 

 ordinated to the production of wealth. In the other, 

 the production of wealth, as represented by large sur- 



