WORN-OUT FARMS AND THEIR POSSIBILITIES. 



BY PROF. W. M. MUNSON, UNIVERSITY OF MAINE. 



Delivered before the Society, February 10, 1906. 



Systematic efforts are being made in several of the New Eng- 

 land states to dispose of the "abandoned" or "worn-out" farms, 

 or to reclaim them. , It seems particularly fitting, therefore, that 

 this society, which for three-fourths of a century has stood for the 

 best that there is in New England agriculture, should consider 

 for a little time the reason for the existence of these abandoned 

 holdings, the ways in which they may best be reclaimed, and 

 some of the possibilities of the future. 



Reasons for Abandoned Farms. 



There is in the American people an inherent spirit of unrest. 

 As a people we are never "settled." In the United States, as one 

 impatiently exclaims, "A man builds a house to spend his later 

 years in, and sells it before the roof is on; he brings a field into 

 tillage, and leaves other men to gather the crops; he embraces a 

 profession, and gives it up; he settles in a place, which he soon 

 after leaves to carry his longing for change elsewhere. If his 

 private affairs leave him any leisure, he plunges into politics. 

 If, perchance, he has a few days vacation, he will travel hundreds 

 of miles to shake off his happiness in a railway train." 



One of the first reasons for the abandoned farms of New Eng- 

 land, then, is the inherent restlessness of the American boy. That 

 this innate restlessness should take active form, however, was a 

 direct result of changed conditions. The conditions and problems 

 presented to the New England farmer of today are very different 

 from those of even half a century ago. In the earlier days, the 

 chief end of the farmer was to supply the immediate food require- 

 ments of his family and of his few animals, w4th possibly a small 



