AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
374 
The American Agriculturist. 
The American Agriculturist was established in 1843, 
or thirty-eight years ago. The first number was 
issued under the editorial supervision of Mr. A. B. 
Allen. The original office was located in the base¬ 
ment of a building which stood on the present site 
of the Times edifice. Subsequently the paper had 
several publishers—including, among others, Sax¬ 
ton & Co., and likewise several assistant editors, 
including Solon Robinson. The office changed 
from one place to another until it was finally located 
at 189 Water street, nearly opposite to the United 
States Hotel. 
In 1853, Mr. Allen called to the editorial chair 
Mr. Orange Judd, whose training he thought spe¬ 
cially fitted him for the place. The latter had been 
reared on a farm, and, after graduating from col¬ 
lege, had devoted some years to the study of the 
Science of Agriculture at YaleCollege with Silliman, 
Norton, Johnson, Weld, and others. In 1856 Mr. 
Judd purchased the paper, and subsequently asso¬ 
ciated others with him in the ownership and edi¬ 
torial management. The following rules of action 
were laid down for its conduct: 
1st.—To make every line reliable. 
2d.—To get the best reading matter at any ex¬ 
pense of time, labor, and money. 
3d.—To engage upon the Editorial staff the best 
men to be found in the country, those of practical 
experience and wide information. 
4th.—To always look after the wants and circum¬ 
stances of those struggling with limited means. 
5th.—To exclude from its business pages all ad¬ 
vertisements of quackery, medicines, and unreliable 
advertisers. 
6th.—To make the paper known to the whole 
country, and adapt its pages to all sections. 
7th.—To make its teachings plain and prac¬ 
tical as well as reliable. 
From this time forward the circulation of the 
paper increased with great rapidity, and, compelled 
to seek more commodious apartments, it removed 
(1859) to spacious quarters extending through 
from Park Row to Nassau Street. New subscrib¬ 
ers continued to pour in from all quarters,and it 
was not long before the American Agriculturist sub¬ 
scription books embraced names from nearly every 
Post-Office in the United States. Since that period 
the regular circulation of the American Agricul¬ 
turist has often been above 100,000, sometimes run¬ 
ning up to nearly 150,000. In 1867 the paper moved 
to its present site—the six-story building at 245 
Broadway—which was purchased and specially 
fitted up at large expense to meet the growing 
wants and requirements of the establishment. 
During the past twenty years the American Agri¬ 
culturist has absorbed, by purchase and otherwise, 
some twenty other journals of a similar character 
throughout the United States. This unexampled 
prosperity has been due to rigid adherence to the 
rules referred to above. It has always been the aim 
of the paper to secure the very ablest talent in the 
country, and, though issued only twelve times a 
year, the annual editorial expenses have been 
larger than those of many metropolitan dailies. 
Eighteen years ago, Dr. George Thurber, who 
is one of the highest authorities in botany and hor¬ 
ticulture and has no superior in general departments 
of knowledge, became associated with Mr. Judd in 
the editorial supervision of the paper, and they 
continue in that relation at the present time. 
The illustrations have been a leading feature of 
the American Agriculturist, and no expense has been 
spared to secure the very best. Many hundred 
thousands of dollars have been expended in this 
manner for the benefit of the readers. 
Another feature which has specially commended 
Itself to the public, and which is still prominently 
maintained, is the exposure of Humbugs and 
fraudulent schemes of all descriptions. Thou¬ 
sands of grateful letters from those who would 
otherwise have suffered, bear witness to the value 
and importance of these exposures. For other 
leading features, we refer the reading public to 
the paper itself. 
Continuing under the same auspices, with strong 
young men training to the work, it may be safely 
predicted that, as grand and successful as has been 
its career in the past, and as high as its standard 
is to-day in circulation and influence, not only 
throughout our own country, but in other lands, 
the American Agriculturist is only entering the gate¬ 
way of a still wider field of circulation, and of use¬ 
ful work and influence. 
The Amerikanischer Agriculturist. 
The Amerikanischer Agriculturist was established 
in 1858, twenty-two years ago. It has had all the 
advantage of the machinery and expense employed 
in the preparation of the American Agriculturist, 
and the writers are thoroughly familiar with the 
wants and requirements of German farmers, gar¬ 
deners, fruit growers, etc., in the United States. 
Professor Charles Munch, of Missouri, whose name 
is well known wherever the German tongue is 
spoken, has for years had control of departments 
in the paper especially adapted to his countrymen, 
and it has given such satisfaction that the German 
Agriculturist is now largely read in the Fatherland. 
One class there take the paper because of the prac¬ 
tical hints and suggestions. Another class, who 
contemplate emigrating to the United States, sub¬ 
scribe in advance to the Amerikanischer Agriculturist, 
in order to acquire knowledge and information re¬ 
garding the climate, soil, and agricultural features 
generally of the new country to which they are 
going. It likewise has subscribers in Russia, Nor¬ 
way, Sweden, and through all Europe. Those in 
this country having relatives and friends in the 
old world, who are preparing to emigrate hither 
and settle on farms, cannot do them a greater ser¬ 
vice than in sending them the Amerikanischer Agri¬ 
culturist, for preparation prior to their departure. 
Like the American Agriculturist, the Amerikanischer 
Agriculturist has successfully gone forward, while 
other similar papers have succumbed, until it is 
now, with one exception, the only purely German 
agricultural journal published in the United States. 
It is furnished at the same low rate as the American 
Agriculturist , viz., $1.50 per year, postage prepaid. 
Why they Do Not Stay on the Farm. 
There is no denying it; the boys do not stay 
upon the farm, and will not unless some constraint 
is put upon them. Why is it ? There are many causes 
operating to this end ; the new land in the west, the 
adventure of mining life in the mountains, the new 
fields open in the cotton belt, speculation and busi¬ 
ness in the neighboring village or city—but above 
all these is the social leanness and starvation of 
American agricultural life. We are speaking now 
of the isolated farming districts, from five to ten 
miles from the market town. Here is the old style 
school house, and the means of education are just 
as they were fifty years ago or more ; the winter 
school of four months, taught by master, and sum¬ 
mer school of three, taught by mistress, both hired 
at cheapest rates, and some are still “ boarding 
round.*’ The old church is yet there for Sunday 
gatherings, and church and school are about the 
only occasions of social life known to old and 
young, except in rare visits to other communities. 
The main thing is work, early and late, summer and 
winter; and the chief problem for the brain to 
solve is how to get a living. The whole population 
is not so much engaged in living, and in enjoying 
life, as in getting ready to live. If we look in-doors 
there is rather a lean larder the year round. Salt 
junk and potatoes are the main stay. The body is 
not well provided for. The search for a soft bed is 
not well rewarded. The intellectual life is more 
poorly fed. Often no paper at all is taken. If one 
is afforded, it is likely to be a political journal. 
Agricultural papers are the rare exception. There 
is little but gossip for the mind to feed upon. The 
school is often neglected because the boys and 
girls are wanted at home. The church is neglected 
because it is not convenient to go to meeting. The 
horse sheds are not built, the horse is lame, the 
carriage has a broken spring, or, more likely, the 
preacher gives out too much light for the surround¬ 
ing darkness. Bats love twilight. The muscles are 
overtaxed, and vitality is mainly occupied in sus¬ 
taining the waste of muscle. There is no time for 
recalling the daily news, for discussing agricultural 
topics even, or for the enjoyment of social life at 
the table. Father and mother live under pressure 
all the while. Hearty sympathetic interest in any¬ 
thing outside of the farm, is almost unknown. 
Smiles are few, and jokes still fewer. Young 
America on the farm revolts against this eternal 
round of solemn facts. He wants a little variety id 
his diet for his body, and for the mind, fie 
has seen agricultural papers with pictures of 
fine horses and cattle, houses, and barns, labor- 
saving machines, and tools. He would like to read 
about these things, and realize the pictures. He 
wants more papers and books, lyeeums, lectures, 
and especially more society. He wants to enjoy 
fife a little while he is young, and not to wait for 
gray hairs before he begins to five.—Here is the 
cause of our waning agriculture and deserted farms. 
The remedy is more easily seen than applied. We 
must have more living while we are getting ready 
to live. 
Business Habits for Farmers. 
There is probably not one farmer in ten thousand 
who keeps a set of accounts from which he can at 
any moment learn the cost of anything he may 
have produced, or even the cost of his real prop¬ 
erty. A very few farmers who have been brought 
up to business habits keep such accounts, and are 
able to tell how their affairs progress, what each 
crop, each kind of stock, or each animal has cost, 
and what each produces. Knowing these points a 
farmer can, to a very great extent, properly decide 
what crops he will grow, and what kind of stock 
he will keep. He will thus be able to apply his 
labor and money where it will do the most good. 
He can weed out his stock and retain only such 
animals as may he kept with profit For the want 
of such knowledge, farmers continue, year after 
year, to feed cows that are unprofitable, and fre¬ 
quently sell for less than her value one that is the 
best of the herd, because she is not known to be 
any better than the rest. Feed is also wasted upon 
ill-bred stock, the keep of which costs three or 
four times that of well-bred animals, which, as has 
been proved by figures that cannot be mistaken, 
pay a large profit on their keeping. For want of 
knowing what they cost, poor crops are raised year 
by year at an actual loss, provided the farmer’s 
labor, at the rates current for common labor, were 
charged against them. To learn that he has been 
working for 50 cents a day, during a number of 
years, while he has been paying his help twice as 
much, would open the eyes of many a farmer who 
has actually been doing this, and it would convince 
him that there is some value in figures and book 
accounts. 
Farm Villages, 
There is no necessity that farmers should he- 
isolated so much as they generally are, nor any 
need that the farm buildings should he in the cen¬ 
ter of each farm. It is simply a matter of figures . 
and calculation, as to whether the saving of a few 
hours’ labor—or a few days in the aggregate—year- . 
ly, in hauling the crops to the barn, with the barn . 
and house in the center of the farm, and a mile • 
away from the nearest neighbor, is of more value : 
or more convenient than to have one’s neighbors ■■ 
closer and one’s fields farther off. There are many 
advantages in having three or four homesteads con¬ 
tiguous and forming a hamlet, or with a few tenant'; 
houses or cottages, a small village. This is especial¬ 
ly desirable in the West, where the land was origi¬ 
nally so divided that four farms necessarily meet at 
one corner, where two roads cross. Where farms 
are 160 acres in extent, there would then be four 
houses together at every mile; four sets of farm 
buildings; four orchards, and four plantations, 
which would condense the shelter provided by 
these, and make it much more effective than 
when scattered half-a-mile apart. There would be 
far better social opportunities than farmers now 
enjoy, and many more opportunities for combining 
labor and capital in joint enterprises. 
