NEW YORK, OCTOBER 27, 1906. 
WEEKLY. $1.00 PEK YEAR. 
Vol. LXY. No. 2961. 
THE HIRED MAN QUESTION . 
New Views of the Subject. 
THE MAN’S SIDE.—Throughout the agricultural 
press the burning question is the scarcity of farm help. 
This question has been treated at great length from the 
standpoint of the farmer in need of help, not by the 
year, but for the brief period only of harvest time. 
But only occasionally does the reader see this question 
from the standpoint of young men and women in need 
of the necessities of life—shelter, food, and clothing— 
during 365 days of the year. All farmers need help. 
Only a few, on the average, hire by the year, a greater 
number for eight months, while the majority need help 
only during the harvesting, just when all farmers need 
extra help. Securing a man by the year is not so 
difficult a matter as to get a good man for eight, or 
five months. The year man becomes more as one of 
the family, and all things considered he has an easier 
position than the man for eight months, and the same 
may be said of the young woman who lives with a 
family by the year. 
There is less inclina¬ 
tion on the part of the 
farmer and his wife to 
crowd the help — to 
work them for all that 
they are worth during 
their time of service, 
and there is also less 
inclination on the part 
of the help to slight 
their work. The year¬ 
ly positions are usually 
permanent opportuni¬ 
ties for both men and 
women; while the de¬ 
mand for a less period 
of service may be ex¬ 
ceptional, and vary for 
men in duration from 
year, to year. 
SUMMER HELP.— 
The ambitious,' trust¬ 
worthy young man who 
finds a congenial home 
on a farm for eight 
months of the year, 
while lie may be able 
to save more of his 
earnings than lie pos¬ 
sibly could in town, at 
the beginning of Win¬ 
ter is out of a job, and 
for four months he 
must either retire, or find work in town. If he secures 
a position and gives satisfaction, with the prospect of 
a promotion with an increase of pay, he will hardly 
be inclined to return to farm work for less time than 
by the year. The young woman .who works on a farm 
during the Summer only, finds herself out of house 
and home after having passed through the Spring and 
Fall housecleaning, and all the stress of Summer house¬ 
work. She too must look to a town opportunity, and 
if she finds her labor of value in store, or shop, there 
she goes of necessity, and remains naturally, where she 
hopes to better herself, and where she has work by 
the year. How can workingmen and women hold 
themselves in readiness for farm work for one, two, or, 
even eight months, just to accommodate the farmers, 
and then be obliged to earn their living in town during 
the remainder of the year? 
THE DAY LABORER.—In large cities there exists 
a large body of unskilled unemployed men (unem¬ 
ployed 1 ecause they are unskilled), wh# might work 
on lartns for even a few weeks; but among this class 
are many short of transportation funds; and others 
not inclined to get strenuous in harvest fields, while 
they can live the “simple life” in town with much less 
exertion. Naturally, the average farmer must take 
his chances with men in his home town who have no 
regular employment, who can be induced to take a 
harvest outing, and the smaller the town the less day 
laborers, as small towns have little in the way of work 
for day men. The unstability of farm work as com¬ 
pared to the past, say 50 years ago, is the result of 
changed conditions in both the agricultural and the 
industrial world. Mechanical inventions in the way of 
farm machinery have reduced the number of working 
days for day men during the seed time and harvesting. 
The use of coal instead of wood; of wire instead of 
rails; of tile instead of stone for the ditch, have all 
combined to take many a dollar from the man who 
takes his chances by the year, as a day laborer in a 
farming section. The actual number of working days 
for the individual man is a question that is always lost 
sight of when there comes from the great West, or the 
East, a call for a large number of men at harvest time. 
Thousands of men might find employment (and do), 
and the sum total of wages represents several large 
fortunes; and yet, no one man might be employed for 
more than 15, 30 or (30 days. Farmers overlook the 
number of working days that they can guarantee to the 
individual man; while the total number of days is a 
vital matter with each workingman, and of necessity 
will either keep a man in the country, or send him to 
town, without regard to his personal choice between 
farm and town life, and work. Just a hard-fact neces¬ 
sity of shelter, food and clothing for 305 days in the 
year. The question of hired help by the day might be 
somewhat solved by the farmers themselves, if they 
•would lay aside their exclusiveness and exchange work, 
just as the pioneer grandfathers did; or. if they would 
combine and make concessions to each other, and thus 
make it possible for workingmen and their families, to 
live among them by the year, as one of the farming 
community. The farmers who can hire by the year 
and pay good wages, are usually so comfortable them¬ 
selves, and feel so independent under their own roof- 
trees, that they are oblivious to the fact that when it 
comes to farm help the farmer is in sharp competition 
with all the other vocations of the whole world. Be¬ 
fore they can meet this competition, they must decide 
upon the class of men and women they desire to at¬ 
tract to their farm homes. If they want intelligent, 
self-respecting men by the year, they must provide com¬ 
fortable and convenient houses; or convert their own 
homes into double dwellings, and thus make it possible 
for young men to marry and have the comforts, and 
especially the privacy of their own homes. 
THE HOME SIDE.—It is not the purpose of this 
article to draw comparisons between farm and town 
life for the workingman. But it has frequently been 
observed that when a country housewife draws such 
comparisons, she emphasizes the advantages of'space; 
the pure air, and food supply of the farm; and hired 
help treated as one of the family; but never a word 
as to a room where a self-respecting young man could 
shave, take a bath (with plenty of clean individual 
towels), write his letters, read his own books; in short, 
get away from the “family” (especially the family 
* towels), without tak¬ 
ing to the barn or the 
woods. The self-re¬ 
specting young man in 
town finds in every re¬ 
spectable boarding 
house, conveniences for 
his physical comfort, 
and absolute privacy, 
which he must take his 
chances on finding 
when he becomes a 
hired man to a farmer. 
It is just possible that 
being made “one of 
the family” has been 
overdone on behalf of 
not only the hired man 
and woman, but also 
the children of the 
farms, who have been 
getting away from the 
“family” until there is 
a scarcity of farm help. 
FAMILY ATTI¬ 
TUDE.—While the un¬ 
stability of farm labor 
is the immediate cause, 
the inability of the 
farmers to keep their 
own boys and girls on 
the farms is the direct, 
the far-reaching cause 
of the great scarcity of 
help on the farm. The recent article by G. N. E., of 
western Massachusetts, on pages 5D7-.S, is a good illus¬ 
tration of the attitude of the children of the farm 
towards farm life for themselves. This bright, ambi¬ 
tious young woman, after citing the pure food advan¬ 
tages of the farm, and many an agricultural accom¬ 
plishment to be “proud of,” makes the following state¬ 
ment : “And now, at the end of a year’s course in a 
well-known commercial college, is ready to take a 
position that combines short hours with good pay, and 
is judged by those who ought to know to be a very 
lucky girl.” Why lucky? [We shall see later that this 
young woman will still live at home.—Eds.] If the 
children of the farms are on the lookout for “short 
hours and good pay,” and if they look elsewhere than 
to farm labor, to becoming land owners, or hired men 
and hired women on farms; it may be assumed that 
the children of the towns and cities will exercise the 
same right and look in the same direction. For, in¬ 
deed, human nature is the same the world over—all 
looking for “short hours and good pay.” In the mean¬ 
time the farmers all need help; a few during the year; 
