322 RURAL SOCIOLOGY 



should have to send for their mail or go without? I am not 

 speaking for Big Hawk Valley alone. In these stretches of 

 country where money is not plentiful, and where the farmers and 

 their wives are dependent upon their own physical exertions for 

 everything necessary for living, Governmental and newspaper 

 urging doesn't take us very far on our way toward good roads. 

 When we shall have automobile roads we shall not need rural 

 delivery. In the meantime we are paying our taxes and are 

 really a part of the United States of America, although we should 

 hardly realize it save for sentimental attachments. 



Since I have been living in Big Hawk Valley, Mr. Secretary, 

 I have often wished for a vote, although it was far from my inten- 

 tion to express my wish in this letter. But here, more than any 

 region I have known, the ballot seems to be a subtle but insur- 

 mountable barrier between me and all questions subject to a vote. 

 Our women take part in the work of men. If necessary, they 

 help take care of the live stock, gather wood, and work in the 

 fields, but their sphere most emphatically does not include "med- 

 dling ' ' with questions to be decided by men alone. 



I am reminded of this by a placard which is posted upon the 

 door of the school-house. It calls attention of parents to the 

 State law which requires six months ' yearly school attendance of 

 every child of the required age. Owing to a curious knot which 

 no one attempts to cut, the children of this neighborhood are 

 getting only four months' schooling in a year, although we are 

 paying taxes for an eight-month term. 



The situation has been brought about through a mistake in dis- 

 tricting the county. Our district includes a near-by mountain 

 and is of illegal length. Since the mountain children must be 

 taught as well, or as poorly, as the valley children, and since 

 neither the mountain, fathers nor the valley fathers are inclined 

 to two wagon trips daily to take the children to school, two little 

 school-houses were built, one in the valley, the other on the 

 heights. One teacher divides the eight months ' term between the 

 highlanders and the lowlanders. This year she serves the moun- 

 tain folk from July through October. The valley children will 

 attend school from October through January. 



I should be an ingrate, Mr. Secretary, if I closed without tell- 

 ing you that I owe my vocational training as a farmer's wife 



