686 
THE RURAb NEW-YORKER 
June 8, 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE BUSINESS FARMER’S PAPER 
A Notional Weekly Journal for Country and Suburban Homes 
Established 1850 
Published we«kly by the Rural Publishing Company, 409 Pearl St., New York 
Herbert W. Collingwood, President and Editor. 
John J. Dillon, Treasurer and General Manager. 
Wn F. Dillon, Secretary. Mrs. E. T. Royi.r, Associate Editor. 
SUBSCRIPTION: ONE DOLLAR A YEAR 
To foreign countries in the Universal Postal Union, §2.01, equal to 8s. 6d., or 
8)4 marks, or 10>£ francs. Remit in money order, express 
order, personal check or hank draft. 
Entered at New York Post Office as Second Class Matter. 
Advertising rates 60 cents per agate line—7 words. Discount for time orders. 
References required for advertisers unknown to us j and 
cash must accompany transient orders. 
“A SQUARE DEAL” 
We believe that every advertisement in this paper is backed by a respon¬ 
sible person. But to make doubly sure we will make good any loss to paid 
subscribers sustained by trusting any deliberate swindler advertising in our 
columns, and any such swindler will be publicly exposed. We protect sub¬ 
scribers against ix>gues. but we do not guarantee to ad j ust tnfung differences 
between subscribers and honest, responsible advertisers. Neither will wo be 
responsible for the debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned by the courts. 
Notice of the complaint must l>e sent to us within one month of the time of 
the transaction, and yon must have mentioned The Rural New-Yorker 
when writing the advertiser. 
TEN WEEKS FOR 10 CENTS. 
In order to introduce The R. N.-Y. to progressive, 
intelligent farmers who do not now take it, we send it 
10 weeks for 10 cents for strictly introductory pur¬ 
poses. We depend on our old friends to make this 
known to neighbors and friends. 
* 
You will help us by sending reports of actual prices 
for farm produce which fanners in your section re¬ 
ceive. Such prices are far more reliable than the 
printed “market reports,” for these are largely man¬ 
ipulated. We wish to compare the actual prices which 
are really paid to farmers. 
* 
On page 687 will be found a letter from the secre¬ 
tary of Senator Briggs, of New Jersey. We are very 
willing to give Mr. Evans opportunity to explain the 
Senator’s stand on parcels post. Our criticism of 
Senator Briggs was that when people asked him if he 
was in favor of the principle of a fair parcels post 
he promised “careful consideration.” There may liava 
been a question in his mind as to which bill should be 
favored, yet he must have known whether he was a 
parcels poster or a paster. 
* 
If Mr. Kleckner, whose “tree dope” is mentioned 
on page 679, does not think a full job has been done 
we will try once more. No use trying to be lady¬ 
like with a man .who says trees will give off fumes 
tliat drive insects away! A surgical operation is the 
only treatment for such cases. These “tree dopers” 
have their run, and often succeed in picking up money. 
They are good talkers, and the less they know about 
a tree the more “guff” they can spray out. As Prof. 
Blake says:—let them practice on a stone fence or on 
the barn door—or on themselves! 
* 
Iowa joins the States which urge the use of lime. 
Her experiment station sends out a very sensible cir¬ 
cular. This has a map showing where the limestone 
quarries are located and gives the facts about lime 
and its use. Ground limestone or screenings are 
recommended. Such screenings are offered at 25 
cents a ton or $5 for 40 tons at the quarry. Of course 
this is not the finest lime, but it will help the soil. 
Let our Eastern farmers think what it would mean to 
buy lime screenings at any such price! Yet they 
ought to be able to do so or come close to it. 
* 
One of our friends tells of receiving an article of 
furniture by express, on which there were charges of 
$1.75, which he paid. A few days later he received 
notice from the express company that the expressage 
on this article was $1.24, instead of 95 cents paid by 
him, and they requested payment of the deficit. Our 
friend wrote unsympathetically to the express com¬ 
pany, observing that evidently the driver had not 
“whacked up” even with the company, hut consider¬ 
ing their statement correct, he would like to receive 
the 51 cents excess paid. There is a temporary break 
m diplomatic relations just now, possibly while the 
company is thinking up an appropriate explanation. 
During the past few years many orchard renting 
companies have been organized in Canada. These 
companies would hire an orchard (usually neglected) 
for a term of years and handle it as they saw fit. In 
many cases there was great profit in such an enter¬ 
prise. Often the orchard had not been pruned or 
sprayed though the trees were sound. In such a con¬ 
dition it gave no profit and the rent was clear gain. 
The renting company would prune and spray and fer¬ 
tilize and make a great profit. Their very success has 
prevented the business from growing, for they have 
shown farmers what such neglected orchards can be 
made to do, and the farmers will do the work them¬ 
selves. 
A city of some 25,000 population had been under a 
prohibitory liquor law for a few years. Some liquor 
was sold, but the saloons could not do an open busi¬ 
ness. The people finally voted for license and about 
30 saloons came back. They averaged sales of about 
$500 per week—some much less, some very much 
more. This made $15,000 in cash taken out of trade 
for necessities and for payment of bills. A collector 
was doing a good business with working people who 
were paying up installments and back debts contracted 
when work was dull. As soon as the saloons opened 
these collections stopped almost entirely—the saloons 
took the money which should have gone for legitimate 
debts and expenses. Storekeepers and farmers all 
suffered, for the saloonkeeper’s consumer's dollar is 
one never divided with the farmer. That is the uni¬ 
versal record whenever saloons are opened in a town 
or city where farmers try to obtain direct trade. The 
rum shop gets the first finger on the dollar and there 
is little left. To a farmer who is trying to deal di¬ 
rect with the middle class of consumers the liquor 
question is a live business proposition. Ask any of 
our readers who run a wagon for direct trade how 
much the saloon competes with them. 
* 
Thanks to Governor Wilson the primary law in 
New Jersey gives a fair chance to test public opinion. 
Of course you cannot compel men to vote, but under 
the New Jersey law the secret ballot is guarded and 
the voter has an opportunity to express his desire for 
a candidate. New Jersey contains all classes among 
its population. There are millionaires who sleep in 
the State or rush over its roads, clerks and business 
men who come and go from New York and Philadel¬ 
phia, local business men, manufacturers and working¬ 
men. There are all grades of farmers, from the most 
expert fruit growers to tenants and hired men. All 
these things combined to make the recent Presidential 
primary the fairest test of public sentiment on the 
question we have yet had in this country. Mr. Roose¬ 
velt won an impressive victory over President Taft. 
The latter had the “machine” back of him and also 
the undoubtedly strong influence of New York City. 
His strength lay among the commuters or men who 
work in the city and live in New Jersey. He was 
weakest with the farmers, as has been the case in 
every test of his strength. There is no longer the 
shadow of a question that a large majority of Repub¬ 
lican farmers want Mr. Roosevelt nominated. Our 
canvass showed that from the first, though we have 
given the supporters of Mr. Taft every chance to dis¬ 
prove it. The Democrats are in a somewhat unfor¬ 
tunate position as regards their candidate. The con¬ 
test between Mr. Roosevelt and President Taft has 
absorbed public attention. Should Mr. Roosevelt now 
be nominated he would gain by the bitter fight already 
made upon him. The Democrats will be forced to 
wait until after the Republican nomination before se¬ 
lecting their candidate, and this will appear to many 
like trimming their sails to suit the wind. Our own 
canvass still shows that Wm. J. Bryan is the favorite 
candidate for the Democrats. It must be admitted that 
Mr. Roosevelt has done what seemed the impossible. 
He has changed what seemed like a gloomy company 
marching in funeral procession, into a crowd of fight¬ 
ers filling up the grave and reviving the corpse. 
* 
We have not known anything quite like the growth 
of the cooperative idea of buying and selling farm 
produce. It has come with a rush—nothing can now 
stop it. On the consumer’s side it is an effort to ob¬ 
tain more food for the consumer’s dollar. On the 
fanner’s side the effort is to get more than 35 cents 
of that same dollar. The R. N.-Y. is most interested 
in this last proposition. It is the most important thing 
in American farming. The schemes for great city 
markets and vast associations for buying city food 
have backers and will be pushed, but it is not along 
these lines that the 35 cents will be increased. That 
is a business proposition of selling which the farmers 
alone can work out. The new demands by consumers 
will make it necessary to have fresh, clean goods 
packed and handled as the consumers demand. We 
take it for granted that some of the useless middle¬ 
men will be cut out. That being so, the producers 
who pack and ship satisfactory goods will get the 
trade. They may be regular farmers, or they may be 
great corporations who will go out and take large 
tracts of land and grow vegetables or fruit or keep 
hens or cows on a large scale. Let us all understand 
that the mighty changes which are coming in city 
buying will force even greater changes in country 
selling. There never was a more hopeful chance for 
the farmers to obtain more than 35 cents of the dol¬ 
lar. but that chance will only come to farmers who 
rise to it and go after it They must organize and 
learn how to put up uniform brands of high-class 
yis. Cooperation among city buyers and unorgan¬ 
ized selling by farmers will put all the advantage in 
the hands of the buyers. Cooperation among farmers 
as sellers will put them on even terms. This is a 
mighty question—with many conflicting sides to it. 
Our side is cooperative work in packing, shipping and 
selling and we shall make a special feature of it. Next 
week it will be the story of a Michigan creamery 
which enabled a group of farmers to be free. We 
shall follow with other facts showing what farmers 
are doing and how they do it. 
* 
The New York Mercantile Exchange has dropped 
the official grade of butter known as “Specials.” 
“Extra” is now the top grade. This means butter 
that scores above 91 points on the basis of: flavor, 
45 per cent; body, 25; color, 15; salt, 10. and style, 
five per cent Butter that scores over 93 will, as a 
rule, sell above the top price quoted for “Extra.” 
This change in grading will make necessary some re¬ 
adjustment in cases where milk is bought on the basis 
of New York butter prices. Milk bought on the basis 
of “Extra” butter when “Extra” was the second 
grade would bring the producer a somewhat higher 
price when “Special” was dropped and “Extra” be¬ 
came the top. The point of special interest to dairy¬ 
men is how much of the fancy butter is “Extra” really 
going to include. If large quantities are to be sold 
at a premium price the change in classification will 
be more nominal than real, and milk buyers by a 
judicious juggling of figures can make skillful argu¬ 
ment for an unwarranted cut in price to the producer. 
* 
Some 20 years ago the Populist party sprang up in 
the West, and grew like a bean vine on rich soil. It 
came at a time of political unrest—due to the fierce 
injustice which Western farmers felt had been meted 
out to them. It was a financial struggle—the blind, 
rough demand for reasonable capital with which to 
save the home. The Populists advocated many so- 
called doctrines which were voted crazy by the old 
parties. These earnest men who felt themselves in 
the clutches of the money lenders were called “wild¬ 
eyed Pops” and various other pleasant names. We 
well remember the fierce hatred with which the col¬ 
leges and so-called learned class attacked the Popu¬ 
lists. Yet which side of the argument has survived? 
One by one the “crazy planks” of that old party have 
been adopted by Democrat or Republican. The party 
which would repudiate them to-day might as well put 
up the sign “To Let,” for the people would refuse 
to occupy it. Those who now advocate “going back to 
sane methods of government” are really the insane, 
for any man of ordinary sense must see what is com¬ 
ing. One of the planks in the old Populist party was 
a demand that the Government lend money to farm¬ 
ers on farm land and farm produce. We have long 
believed that this theory is sensible and sound, and 
that sooner or later the National or State government 
will be forced to recognize it. In the old days the 
Kansas Agricultural College joined the crowd in ridi¬ 
culing the “Pops.” It does not seem to “stand pat.” 
J. H. Miller, director of college extension work in 
Kansas, says: 
Kansas should have a State fund of one million dollars 
to lend farmers on a low rate of interest when crops fail. 
Such a fund would enable farmers to borrow money with¬ 
out mortgaging their farms to “loan sharks.” The State, 
or even a county, should he able also to make three per 
cent loans on grain in crib or elevator when prices are 
too low for profit. The farmer is just as much entitled to 
profit on his wheat, corn or hogs as is the dealer. Tn July 
and August, this year, thousands of farmers will be com¬ 
pelled to sell their wheat, no matter if the price should be 
beaten down to 50 cents a bushel. 
Quietly and yet as irresistably as a rising flood 
% 
these old demands for popular government and popu¬ 
lar justice have grown. They have lived on through 
ridicule, force, hatred, and attempted bribery, and now 
nothing can shut them off. 
BREVITIES. 
Mississippi is to vote on the question of capital pun¬ 
ishment. 
If lack of grit will spoil a lion—it’s doubly true of grown¬ 
up men. 
Try the plan noted on page 685 of using gasoline to 
kill dandelions on the lawn. 
Whoever saw a farmer reach the top who did his farm¬ 
ing at the blacksmith’s shop? 
Let the child own something. Have no string tied to 
it, but give it outright to the child. 
When a man wants to finger something that belongs to 
others he favors the rule of thumb. 
In his New Jersey campaign Mr. Roosevelt took up one 
variation of the 35-cent dollar as an argument. 
We are getting a number of letters from people who 
tell what they would do with that 860,000,000 if they 
had it. 
The New York Experiment Station shows that lime- 
sulphur cannot replace Bordeaux mixture as a remedy for 
potato disease. 
