THE ADYANTAGES OF NEW ENGLAND AS A FRUIT- 

 GROWING CENTER/ 



G, A. DREW, GREENWICH, CONN. 



]S^ot SO very many years ago it was the general opinion that 

 agriculture held out little inducernent as a profession any- 

 where in New England. If a young man signified his inten- 

 tion of going farming, he was looked on as an object of pity 

 or held up to derision. Even in our own agricultural col- 

 leges, where agriculture should have had its stoutest cham- 

 pions, the impression sometimes prevailed that those in 

 authority often felt obliged to apologize or explain their 

 connection with it. 



Now all this is changed or fast changing. Farming is no 

 longer looked on as a discredited occupation ; the young man 

 sees a future where his father saw only a meager existence 

 of drudgery, and our agricultural colleges are no longer 

 ashamed of having agriculture spelled with a capital A. 

 Many causes have combined to bring about this result, such as 

 the congestion in our cities, the high price of foodstuffs, im- 

 proved conditions of country life; but more than all else 

 people have come to a realization that after all there is no 

 place like New England to live in, no place that combines so 

 many advantages and where agricultural opportunities have 

 so long lain dormant. 



The cheap land of the west is a thing of the past ; the free 

 homesteads there are all taken up; crops can no longer be 

 profitably grown without certain expenditure and intelligent 

 care; in fact, the western country has approached or is rap- 

 idly approaching the same agricultural conditions that con- 

 fronted New England years ago. 



N'ew England is the home of conservatism. It is just be- 

 ginning to dawn upon her that she is still an agricutural 

 factor to be reckoned with; that her soils are not worn out. 



'Agriculture of Massachusetts, 1911. 



