56 



BULLETIN 1068, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



READING MATERIAL OF THE TENURE CLASSES. 



The extent to which the different tenure classes have access to 

 periodical literature is shown in Table 32. Excepting croppers, 39.1 

 per cent of whom had no periodical literature, practically no farmer's 

 family was without some periodical. Moreover, this encouraging 

 fact is made more bright by the nature of this literature, which in 

 most cases was first-class reading material. 



Daily newspapers from the larger cities and towns of the black 

 land constitute the greatest source of reading material for farmers 

 in the area. In all tenure classes there were taken about as many 

 daily newspapers as any other class of literature given in the table ; 

 and this fact, coupled with the more frequent issue of dailies, easily 

 places them in the first rank in amount of reading material furnished. 



From the instructional standpoint agricultural journals occupy 

 the next most important place in the reading material of farm opera- 

 tors. However, a close second to the agricultural journals are the 

 magazines, which as a rule are issued monthly. A few periodicals 

 printed in the State dominate these two classes, and their influence 

 among farmers is very great. Over 75 per cent of the total receipts 

 of periodical literature were Texas publications. 



The time devoted to reading books is relatively small as compared 

 with the time spent in reading periodical literature. No books what- 

 ever, excepting school books, were found in 39 per cent of all owners' 

 homes, and in 36 per cent of all tenants' homes. 



Table 32. — Periodical reading material in the homes of the different tenure 



classes. 









Nonagricul- 







Agricultural 

 journals. 



Operators who 





Daily papers. 



tural weekly 

 papers. 



Maga 



zmes. 



have no period- 

 ical literature. 



















Per 







Tenure class. 



Num- 



Per 



Num- 



Per 



Num- 



Per 



Num- 



cent 

 who 

 had 



agri- 



Num- 



Per 



cent 

 of all 

 oper- 





ber 



cent 



ber 



cent 



ber 



cent 



ber 



ber 





report- 



who 



report- 



who 



report- 



who 



report- 



report- 





ing on 



had 



ing on 



had 



ing on 



had 



ing on 



ing on 





ques- 



daily 



ques- 



weekly 



ques- 



maga- 



ques- 





ques- 







tion. 



papers. 



tion. 



papers. 



tion. 



zines. 



tion. 



jour- 

 nals. 



tion. "£— 





63 

 185 

 106 

 354 



34.9 

 57.8 

 67.9 

 50.8 



63 

 183 

 103 

 349 



36.5 

 60.7 

 62.2 

 56.7 



64 

 186 

 105 

 355 



32.8 

 45.7 

 53.3 

 45.6 



62 

 184 

 105 

 351 



30.6 

 51.6 

 59.0 

 50.1 



64' 39.1 





186 I 4.3 





106 0.0 



All operators 



356 



9.0 



RELATION BETWEEN TENURE AND EDUCATION. 



In order to ascertain facts as to the relation between tenure and 

 education in the black land, data were taken from the teachers' 



