344 Singing Valleys 



labor per hundred acres make possible the plowing and plant- 

 ing of greatly increased acreage? Bigger farms, plus scientific 

 methods, meant bigger crops; and by all the known laws of 

 economics, bigger profits. 



The argument won. The century which began with the 

 invention of the cast-iron plow closed with one million, two 

 hundred and fifty thousand tractors at work on American 

 farms. 



What happened to the laws of economics? Was it the 

 series of droughts which scorched the crop lands for several 

 successive years? The drought of 1934 was the worst in this 

 country's history. One out of every seven farmers in America 

 went on relief. Neither scientific farming nor motor power on 

 the farm could hold off the enemy. Was it the series of floods 

 which washed the alluvial soil down the rivers to the Gulf? 

 Motor power won't stop the waters. Was it the turning of 

 vast areas into dust bowls? Dr. Hugh Bennett, chief of the 

 Soil Conservation Service, told the House Labor Committee: 

 "We are losing every day, as a result of erosion, the equiva- 

 lent of two hundred forty-acre farms." Was it the passing of 

 the country banker, and the increased control of rural by 

 urban banks? The decade 1921-1931 was one of unprecedented 

 mortality among banks. The final year of that period saw more 

 than two thousand failures. Mortality was highest in the mid- 

 west and south in the corn-growing area and in centers 

 of under ten thousand population. These failures, and the 

 mergers with larger banks which took place in great number 

 during the period, were owing in very few cases to departure 

 from normal banking practice. They reflected the decline in 

 land values, and in the prices of farm produce. The Wall 

 Street crash sent its effects out through the country because 

 of the heavy losses by important patrons of local banks. 



Business suffered from bank failures; but the farmers suf- 

 fered even more, for the reason that in the small centers bank- 

 ing is almost a personal service. The urban control of rural 

 banks, which is a trend of the times, can result in real hard- 



