CONSUMPTION 117 



bought by farmers in North Carolina and Georgia is very low, being 

 approximately only one-half as much as the average for all the states. 

 In Texas the value of these purchases is high, owing to the fact that 

 the section visited is quite dry at intervals during the summer and 

 that therefore less vegetables and fruits are raised. A large percen- 

 tage of the wood used for fuel in Texas is also bought. 



Of the products bought, mentioned in Table II, 86 per cent is food; 

 8 per cent, coal ; i . 5 per cent, wood ; and 4 . 5 per cent, oil. The total 

 value of these is $173 . 91 for a family of 4 . 6 persons. It can thus be 

 seen that if an attempt were made to reduce this annual cost or 

 expenditure, the first effort should be to raise more food products. 



29. CRITICISM OF PRESENT CONDITIONS ON THE FARM 1 



"In many homes life on the farm is a somewhat one-sided affair. 

 Many times the spare money above living expenses is expended on 

 costly machinery and farm implements to make the farmer's work 

 lighter; on more land where there is already a sufficiency; on expen- 

 sive horses and cattle and new outbuildings, while little or nothing 

 is done for home improvement and no provision made for the comfort 

 and convenience of the women of the family." "If a silo will help to 

 reduce the man's labor, a vacuum cleaner will do likewise for his wife. 

 If the stock at the barn needs a good water system to help them grow, 

 the stock in the house needs it too, and needs it warm for baths." 

 "You see many a farm where there is a cement floor in the barn, to 

 which the farmer will point with pride the cellar in the house awful. 

 A sheep dip, but no bathtub; a fine buggy and a poor baby carriage. 

 On many farms a hundred m dollars in cash are not spent in the home 

 in a year." 



"Teach the men that we need the new improvements in our homes 

 as much as they in their fields. So many of us are cooking on the 

 same old stoves we first began housekeeping with; still rub our clothes 

 on the washboard on wash day; use the same homemade tables, 

 benches, and beds we have always had to keep house with. The men 

 around us have bought automobiles, mowers, rakes, hay racks, and 

 new patent stackers, sulky plows and harrows, cultivators and wagons, 

 and in fact whenever they see something that will lighten their labors 



1 Excerpts from the letters received by the Department of Agriculture in 

 response to letters of inquiry concerning the needs of farm women, published in 

 Reports No. 104 and No. 106, Office of the Secretary. 



