NEW YORK, MARCH 28, 1908. 
WEEKLY, $1.00 PER YEAR. 
VOL. LXVII. No. 3035. 
TWO YOUNG PRIZE-WINNING FARMERS. 
And the Corn They Grew. 
A prize to the country school which would make 
the best exhibit of teaching agriculture was among 
the unusual features of the North Carolina State 
Fair last year. The exhibit which won the prize was 
made by Messrs. Ransom Middleton and Pearl Britt, 
of Panther Branch School No. 2, of Wake County, a 
school lying 10 or 12 miles from Raleigh. The ex¬ 
hibit is particularly noteworthy for two reasons: first, 
because it shows that agriculture is securing its 
proper foothold in the country schools; and second, 
because this exhibit demonstrates that rural school 
agriculture teaches things which will result in the 
raising of better crops, not only by the pupils but by 
the parents as well. The point illustrated by these 
exhibits was the value of testing individual ears of 
corn before planting. The boys, as a result of what 
they learned in school, had made the individual ear 
test in the manner described in Farmers’ Bulletin No. 
253 and also described 
by me in the columns of 
the Progressive Farmer, 
last Spring, and on 
my Spring lecture tour 
through Wake County. 
The boys planted the 
seed from tested corn 
by the side of their 
fathers’ corn raised from 
untested seed. The boys’ 
“stand” was much better 
than that of their 
fathers, and the result¬ 
ing yield was corre¬ 
spondingly better. One 
of the most significant 
points of the exhibit 
was the card signed by 
the father of one of the 
boys in which he said: 
“My son’s yield from 
tested seed zvas so much 
greater than my own 
from untested seed, that 
I have decided to test all 
my seed in the future.” 
The letter of Pearl 
Britt describing his test 
is as follows: 
“I made my testing 
box in 12 squares, and 
numbered each one, be¬ 
ginning at one on up to 12. I took 12 ears of nice 
corn and numbered them the same. I planted 10 
grains of corn in each square. The second, fourth 
^nd eighth were first to come up, and had more 
sprouts than any of the rest, and of course they 
were the ones I planted. I have planted my patch, 
and it has all come up without a missing place. I 
was rather late in getting my corn tested and ready 
to plant, but I hope it will do well. I am from the 
Turner School and am working for the prize. 
S.—You have mistaken me for a girl by having 
a girl’s name, but I am a boy.” 
The statement of Ransom Middleton is also given 
below: 
“After your lecture at our school I made a test 
hox. I made it 20x20 inches, and divided it into 50 
squares, each 2x4 inches. I filled the box with good 
rich soil. I then selected 50 good nice ears that came 
off stalks that had two ears to the stalk. I planted 
10 grains off each ear, but it was so cold that it did 
not come up well, and when it did come up the 
chickens scratched a lot of it up, but I picked out 
about a dozen sections that 100 per cent came up. I 
planted it the twenty-second of May, planting 1,579 
hills, one grain in a hill, in rows 4/4 feet wide. I 
plowed it the first time June 24, and also put about 
150 pounds of acid phosphate, analyzing 16 per cent 
to the acre. I plowed it the second time July 4; 
plowed it the third and last time July 20, and also 
put 300 pounds of guano to the acre; 95.75 per cent of 
it came up, but think all would have done so but for 
the moles, which ran over a good part of the plot.” 
It is very encouraging indeed to see the school chil¬ 
dren taking this interest in agricultural work, and 
even more so to see that the results obtained by the 
children through new methods are effective in leading 
the fathers to take up these new methods. This prize 
will be offered again next year arid is open to every 
rural school in North Carolina. The prizes, three in 
number, consisting of $25, $15 and $10, are well worth 
the efforts of the teacher. This amount of money 
would do much toward beautifying the school room 
and rendering it more attractive. The prize is offered 
CORN EXHIBIT OF A NORTH CAROLINA COUNTRY SCHOOL. Fig. 121 
for the best exhibit of methods of teaching agricul¬ 
ture in the school. It is hoped that many schools will 
compete next year, and that the teachers will have 
this competition in view throughout the year, thus 
making the exhibits especially complete. Any teach¬ 
ers who desire suggestions as to methods of teaching 
agriculture in the schools, or suggestions as to what 
they may do in preparation for the next State Fair 
exhibit may write to me and I shall be glad to give 
them personal assistance. f. l. stevens. 
West Raleigh, N. C. 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF MULCHING. 
The discussion of orchard experiments, as to mulch¬ 
ing versus cultivation, has been very profitable and 
very interesting. I am inclined to think that we all 
agree that the “cultivators” have the advantage, in 
that their works are now apparent, and it is so 
familiar with us all to look for increase from tillage. 
We must, however, remember that the way of nature, 
in maintaining wood growths, has always been to 
favor with the strongest growth the sheltered nooks, 
and it is also true that the flats and level lands have, 
in nature, not produced good trees, but lain open in 
prairies or had but scanty growths, as in the familiar 
eastern “barrens.” It is altogether possible that time 
may prove that shelter for our tree-growths will be 
more valuable than a system of culture which tends 
to the exhaustion of the carbonaceous materials in 
our soils; and that feeding lands with carbon will be 
the wisest system of economy in the long run. 
Without desiring in any sense, to say the last 
word, may I not add a few observations as to shelters 
and the effects of moisture? It has been proven in 
rainless belts that moisture provided to soils not pois¬ 
oned by residuum from evaporation will change the 
character of a whole countryside from desert to 
blooming garden; that a worthless belt may be re¬ 
claimed by irrigation, all due to nothing but a differ¬ 
ence in soil moisture. In the East, .the greatest foe 
to a proper soil humidity is wind; and it seems not 
to be properly feared as such. It may “be observed 
in any field that the growth of plants near fences is 
much more rank and 
dense than in the middle 
of fields; and also, to a 
certain extent, other 
things being normally 
equal, that the small 
place, made up of little 
fields, yields crops out of 
all proportion to those 
of its larger neighboring 
farms. This seems to be 
a point vital to the con¬ 
troversy which I have 
not noticed as being par¬ 
ticularly emphasized; 
and I think much more 
of the success of mulch¬ 
ing is due to the wind¬ 
breaking and moisture- 
conserving effects of the 
Ohio Station’s mule h 
than the “ashes-to-ashes- 
a n d-dust-t o-dust-effect” 
of decaying rootlets. 
That doesn’t soun d 
good to me. 
I quote from King, 
“Irrigation and Drain¬ 
age,” pages 169 and 170: 
“A scanty hedge-row 
produced differences in 
evaporation as follows: 
During an interval of 
one hour at 20 feet from hedge-row evaporation was 
10.3 c.c.; at 150 feet, 12.5 c.c.; at 300 feet, 13.4 c.c. 
The drying effect of the wind at 300 feet was 30 
per cent greater than at 20 feet and seven per cent 
greater than at 150 feet from the hedge.” “Then, too, 
when the air came across a clover field 780 feet wide 
the observed rates of evaporation were: At 20 feet 
from clover, 9.3 c.c.; at 150 feet, 12.1 c.c.; at 300 feet, 
13 c.c., or 40 per cent greater at 300 feet away than 
at 20 feet and 7.4 per cent greater than at 150 feet. 
The protective influence of grass lands, and the dis¬ 
advantage of very broad fields on these light lands 
was further shown by an increasingly poorer stand 
of young clover as the eastern margin of these fields 
was approached even when the drifting (of the sand) 
had been inappreciable. Below are given the number 
of clover plants per equal areas on three different 
farms as the distance to the eastzvard of the grass 
fields increased: No. 1, at 50 feet, 574 plants; at 200 
feet, 390 plants; at 400 feet, 231 plants. No. 2, at 100 
feet, 249 plants; at 200 feet, 277 plants; at 400 feet, 
193 plants; at 600 feet. 189 plants; at 800 feet, 138 
