THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
1123 
1912. 
AGRICULTURAL CREDITS IN EUROPE. 
No. I. 
In the States we have had a great 
deal of romance and fiction about the 
superior condition of the European 
farmer. I did not find his condition 
ideal, nor his system perfect, and yet 
we can study his position with interest 
and profit. 
The one thing that impresses the 
American student abroad above all 
things else is the fact that the farmers 
of every European country have a sys¬ 
tem provided by special statutes to fi¬ 
nance not only the investment in their 
farms, but also to finance their improve¬ 
ment and operations. These agrarian 
financial systems have been extended 
to India, to Japan, and even to 
Russia. The American farmer alone is 
without any financial system suited to 
the importance of his industry and the 
needs of his business. To be sure these 
European systems are in the main juve¬ 
nile, crude and cumbersome. The 
principle is all we can take from them. 
As early as the middle of the eighteenth 
century the ravages of war, and the 
usurious exactions of the money lenders 
drove the land owners of Prussia to de¬ 
mand a system of credits based on land 
as asset. This was formulated into a 
law in 1720, which seems to form the 
basis of cooperative mortgage credits 
now known as the “Land-schaften.” A 
hundred years later the competition of 
new countries with virgin soil and 
great productions, combined with the 
usurer and the sword to drive the tiller 
of the land and the artisan to seek re¬ 
lief in cooperation of various forms 
and particularly in cooperative credits. 
This resulted in the organization of the 
“Schutse-Deletzsch” for townspeople 
and to some extent for small farmers, 
and later the Raiffe ssen Credit Associa¬ 
tion for small farmers exclusively. Orig¬ 
inally these societies seem to have been 
independent, and organized respectively 
under the inspection of two men by the 
name of Schutze and Raiffeissen. But 
the European governments needed men 
and food, and the organizations were 
fostered by special laws, by exemption 
from taxation, by appropriations of 
money, and in many instances by sub¬ 
sidies. The three systems referred to 
as having originated in Germany form 
the basis of all the farm cooperative 
credit associations that I found in 
Europe. True, they have been changed 
and modified to suit special conditions, 
or to meet the views of men in different 
localities and times both in Germany 
and in other countries; but all of the 
new societies may all be classified under 
one or the other of the three heads. 
During the past Winter Mr. Price gave 
us a very clear description of the Land- 
schaften, with full details of its opera¬ 
tion. These articles were published in 
The R. N.-Y. in issues of April 6 and 
April 13, 1912. Our readers are there¬ 
fore familiar with this system and it 
will not be necessary to repeat the de¬ 
scription in detail. The principle is that 
the land-owners of a given division such 
as a parish, school district or township, 
by combining together, may give a joint 
and several mortgage, and borrow 
money for purchase or improvements 
at a much lower rate of interest than 
the several holders could separately. 
They give a bond corresponding to a 
township, village or school district bond, 
and then loan the money to the indivi¬ 
dual for a long term of years at a rate 
enough above the bond rate to cover 
expenses, and in some cases provide a 
small surplus. This form of credit is 
not adapted to small credits for current 
use. It is used to finance long-term 
mortgages for purchase-price or im¬ 
provement. Neither is it well adapted 
to the needs of communities where 
farms are of various sizes, and the 
owners differing widely in enterprise, 
wealth and social and mental conditions. 
In Germany it originated with the 
favored or proprietary class in the eigh¬ 
teenth century; but recently it has been 
adopted with great success by the peas¬ 
ant proprietors of small acreages. For 
this form of credit special banks have 
also been organized under law in many 
of the European countries, notably in 
Germany, France, Denmark and 
Switzerland. All of these special banks 
receive Government favor in one form 
or another, and many of them receive 
direct Government subsidies. The rate 
of interest is fixed by law. 
We cannot adopt any of the European 
forms of this system in America. We 
do not want any governmental sub¬ 
sidies; and we want a system that will 
meet the needs and the approval of all 
classes of farmers, large or small, 
struggling or prosperous. We do not 
find* a model for our use, but we do 
# 
find a suggestion in the Swiss Canton 
banks for the development of a farm 
mortgage loan bank which would solve 
the problem of farm mortgage loans 
covering long periods of credit and at 
reasonable rates of interest. 
From a study of the systems used in 
the different countries of Europe, we 
may develop a system suitable to Amer¬ 
ican conditions. john j. dillon. 
EVENTS OF THE WEEK. 
DOMESTIC.—October 16 Mrs. Rosen¬ 
thal, widow of the gambler murdered in 
New York, gave testimony extremely dam¬ 
aging to Police Lieutenant Becker. Other 
witnesses testified to the constant associa¬ 
tion of Becker with various gamblers, with 
whom he took meals and attended social 
gatherings. October 21, witnesses called 
by the defense proved of little value. Three 
of them were prisoners from the Tombs, 
two of whom are awaiting trial for murder 
or burglary and the third a “trusty.” The 
criminal records of the Tombs witnesses, 
as brought out by District Attorney Whit¬ 
man, probably entirely discredited their 
testimony with the jury. In some instances 
the cross-examination of the defense’s wit¬ 
nesses brought out testimony that appar¬ 
ently strengthened the case for the prose¬ 
cution. Shapiro, the chauffeur of the 
“murder car,” was a damaging w'itness 
against Becker, October 22. 
Fire at North Tarrytown, N. Y., October 
16, swept through a frame tenement house, 
causing the death of two girls and a prop¬ 
erty loss of $50,000; 30 families were left 
homeless. 
Weldon Brinton Heyburn, United States 
Senator from Idaho, died at Washington, 
October 17. Senator Heyburn was born in 
Delaware County, Pennsylvania, on May 
23, 1852. Ilis parents were Quakers. He 
was admitted to the bar in 1876 and went 
to Idaho, w'here he specialized in mining 
law, gaining the reputation of being one 
of the best equipped advisers on this phase 
of the law' in the United States. Mr. Iley- 
burn got his start in politics in 1896 when 
he refused to follow the bolting Idaho 
Free Silver Republicans in their flop to 
Bryan. He ran for Congress in 1898, but 
w r as defeated by a fusion of Democrats, 
Populists and Silver Republicans. When 
Idaho swung away from the free silver 
craze, however, Mr. Heyburn rode into the 
Senate in 1903 as a protectionist and gold 
Republican. 
The main storehouse of the Benicia ar¬ 
senal at the United States military reserva¬ 
tion, at Benicia, Cal., was burned October 
17 with a loss estimated between $3,- 
000,000 and $4,000,000. The fire is be¬ 
lieved to have originated from spontaneous 
combustion. Sixty thousand stands of 
small arms and 12,000,000 rounds of am¬ 
munition were destroyed. Because cf the 
explosion of the cartridges the work of 
fighting the fire was hazardous. The Be¬ 
nicia arsenal was the main equipping sta¬ 
tion for both the Pacific Coast and the 
Orient. 
The entire Huggins family of Roscoe, 
N. Y., pleaded guilty in the United States 
District Court at New York, October 17, of 
using the mails to defraud. They are Wil¬ 
liam Huggins, his .wife, Florence O. Hug¬ 
gins, and his son, Cecil. Huggins admitted 
having served time for a similar offense. 
When the Hugginses decided to make Ros¬ 
coe township their home about a year ago 
they set up a meat and poultry store. They 
sent mail orders throughout Northern New 
York and part of New England. After a 
while farmers who had sent meat and other 
products to them complained to the post 
office authorities that they were not getting 
their pay. Judge Mayer sent the elder 
Huggins to the Federal Penitentiary at At¬ 
lanta, Ga.. for 18 months and suspended 
sentence on Mrs. Huggins and the son. 
Forty persons were burned severely in 
an automobile explosion at Petaluma, Cal., 
October 20. Mayor Zartman and three 
others may die. A crowd gathered about 
a burning automobile that had been 
dragged from a garage. Mayor Zartman, 
who is Chief of the Fire Department, re¬ 
sponded to the Are alarm and attacked the 
blaze with a chemical extinguisher. The 
Mayor was thrown 40 feet by the explosion. 
The crowd was swept by a blast of flame 
and several persons were trampled in the 
panic. 
Asserting that the disappearance of 
skunks from the Ashokan, N. Y., district 
has deprived him of a substantial annual 
income, Alvah Richardson, a trapper, has 
filed a claim for $560 against New York 
City. The trapper says that the coming of 
the army of workmen to build the Ashokan 
dam for New York’s water supply has 
driven the skunks from the region.' The 
Business Damage Commission now has the 
claim under consideration and the mem¬ 
bers are wondering how they are to learn 
for their own satisfaction as to whether 
the skunks have really gone. For more 
than a dozen years Richardson has been 
earning his living as a trapper in Ulster 
County and skunks were his specialty. He 
says that their skins helped support a big 
family. 
The Canadian board of investigation, 
constituted under the Combines Investiga¬ 
tion Act, in its report to the Government 
at Ottawa, made public October 22, finds 
that the United Shoe Machinery Company 
of Canada, the parent company of which 
has headquarters in Boston, is a “com¬ 
bine,” and that the clauses of its leases 
restricting the use of leased machinery 
operate in restraint of trade. The board, 
however, in view of all the circumstances, 
recommends that the fine of $1,000 a day 
provided for such cases shall not come 
into effect for six months, instead of at 
the end of 10 days after the publication 
of the judgment. W. J. White, the com¬ 
pany’s nominee on the board, presented a 
minority and dissenting report. The com¬ 
pany under investigation is very powerful 
in the United States, where complaints 
have been made of its system of leasing 
machinery with business restrictions. 
FARM AND GARDEN.—The sixth an¬ 
nual fruit exhibit of the Now York State '■ 
College of Agriculture will be held at Cor¬ 
nell University, Ithaca, N: Y r „ November 7, 
8 and 9. The exhibit has grown- in size , 
and completeness each year since it was 
originated until now it is one of the most 
comprehensive held in this State. Hast 
year it included over 100 varieties of ap¬ 
ples, 60 varieties of pears and a smaller 
number of all other fruits, which could be 
held in cold storage until the time of the 
exhibit. It embraces representative col¬ 
lections from every great fruit-growing 
State in the Union, as well as New York 
State. 
One day at the State Fair this year 
would have warmed the heart of any dis¬ 
couraged Missouri fruit grower. The dis¬ 
play demonstrated beyond doubt that Mis¬ 
souri can grow' apples and pears equal to 
the best the West produces. Winners at 
the fair this year carried off two dollars 
where they got one last year. The State 
Board of Horticulture got behind the hor¬ 
ticultural display this year and made it 
possible to double the premiums. Although 
the average fruit grower of Missouri does 
not exhibit solely for the money, it makes 
him feel good to carry home cash as well 
as ribbons. All of the premium plates 
of apples and pears, both first and second, 
were turned over to Secretary Boles of the 
State Board of Horticulture. Each speci¬ 
men of fruit was double wrapped in paper 
and marked with grower’s name. This 
fruit w'ill be held in cold storage at Co¬ 
lumbia until the 13th of January, when 
it will be unpacked and put on exhibition 
during Farmers’ Week at the University. 
MEXICO.—The tropical hurricane which 
swept the upper Gulf coast of Mexico Oc¬ 
tober 16-17 caused a heavy loss of life 
and the destruction of much property. Re¬ 
ports received from points as far as Soto 
La Marina, over 150 miles from Mata- 
moras, tell of desolation caused by the 
terrific wind and overflow of waters.of the 
Gulf. In some localities the inundation 
swept inland for 25 miles. Scores of little 
villages along the coast were destroyed. 
Nearly all of the town of Soto La Marina 
was swept aw'ay. Among the nearby towns 
to Matamoras which were destroyed were 
Santa Teresa and San Fernando. The 
chain of islands lying between the Gulf 
and the Laguna Madre w’ere about 10 feet 
under water during the height of the 
storm and it is thought all persons and 
live stock upon these islands were drowned. 
Relief expeditions have been ordered to 
the scene of the disaster by the Governor 
of the State of Tamaulipas. 
PHILIPPINES.-—The typhoon which 
swept several of the islands of the Philip¬ 
pine group on October 16 caused many 
deaths and heavy damage to property, it 
is estimated that 400 persons were killed 
and damage amounting to $5,000,000 was 
done by the storm in the Island of Cebu. 
The typhoon levelled thousands of houses, 
vessels were swept ashore and sunk and 
their crews were drowned. Many Ameri¬ 
cans and Filipinos are homeless. Warwick 
Barracks was entirely destroyed and the 
military hospital stores damaged. In addi¬ 
tion to the many vessels lost in the vicin¬ 
ity of Cebu several also were sunk in the 
harbor. The lighthouse there was badly 
damaged. Meagre reports from Visayas 
say the storm -was unusually severe there. 
The Government is dispatching a relief 
steamer to Cebu and Visayas. In addition 
to the loss of life and property, it is be¬ 
lieved that severe damage was done to the 
sugar, rice and hemp crops. 
THE BALKAN WAR. — October 18 
Greece declared war against Turkey; Ser- 
via, Bulgaria, Montenegro and Roumania 
being already active. It is reported from 
Warsaw that the Polish socialist party is 
displaying great activity with a view to 
organizing a revolution in Russian Poland 
as soon as Russia begins to interfere in 
the war, an emergency which Polish so¬ 
cialists believe inevitable. 
CROPS 
Potato Prospects. 
The crop in the West is very good, with 
the exceptions of the stations at Greeley, 
Colo., and in the Greeley district. The 
crop there did not materialize as well as 
was anticipated on account of weak seed, 
and we believe the further fact that the 
ground had been used for potatoes too 
much.. The yield in the Greeley district 
will be about 20 to 25 per cent of normal, 
but this will be offset by a heavy yield on 
the western slope of Colorado, a heavy 
yield in the San Luis Valley and an ex¬ 
tremely heavy yield on a large acreage in 
Idaho. We also understand that there are 
a great many potatoes in Northern Mon¬ 
tana this year, as compared with last year. 
There is a district up there where they 
raise a great many dry land potatoes. 
The crop in Washington and Oregon is 
also very heavy, and locally in Kansas, 
Nebraska and Missouri the crop is good, 
and territories that were formerly heavy 
consuming places are now able to furnish 
their own stuff. They do not ship any¬ 
thing, but on the other hand they are not 
buyers. We believe that the crop report 
as gotten out by the Government is some¬ 
what overestimated, but that there are 
a great many potatoes grown in every 
district in the country on account of the 
high price last year, and that the con¬ 
sumption will not be as noticeable coming 
from the large districts. A great many 
people will have sufficient potatoes to take 
care of them at home without buying any¬ 
thing. 
The crop in Minnesota is very heavy and 
potatoes are selling cheaper there now than 
they have for the last two or three years, 
and while the stock is not first class as 
compared with last season, yet it is aver¬ 
age, and the quality of the crop in Colo¬ 
rado and Western Idaho is very fine. The 
only thing that they have to fear is a 
hard freeze. Most of the digging is over 
and if the weather remains good until 
about October 20 it will all be out of the 
ground and in the cellars, where it will 
be safe. We have had no end of trouble 
to get cars out there and this has forced 
the growers into putting their stuff into 
cellars, and there are some districts where 
they did not have storage in which to 
put their potatoes. If they do not get 
cars within the next two weeks of course 
they will lose theirs, being frozen in the 
ground, as it is only a matter of a few 
days until the ground will freeze up . in 
Idaho: and Colorado. 
THE BOYI.B COMMISSION COMPANY. 
Wichita, Kan. 
It is pretty hard for us to give you a 
fair estimate of what the crop is through¬ 
out Minnesota and Wisconsin, although we 
operate in both States. However, think 
by the time we get the final results that 
our crop in Minnesota and Wisconsin will 
not be any larger than it was last year. 
The stock is not as plentiful as it was 
last year. We understand that a great 
deal of the crop is still in the ground in 
some sections of the State, and if such is 
the case, if we get very severe weather, 
there will be a heavy loss to the producer. 
If you say the Minnesota and Wisconsin 
crop is about the same as last year you 
will not miss it very far. 
VARLEY-WOLTER CO. 
Minneapolis, Minn. 
We believe the Government estimate on 
the potato crop in Wisconsin, Michigan 
and Minnesota to be in error. On a whole, 
however, this country has a good big crop 
of potatoes, but we do not think that the 
States above mentioned will have to ex¬ 
ceed probably 70 or 75 per cent of their 
last year's crop. It must be borne in 
mind, however, that last year the Govern¬ 
ment was also in error, and in our estima¬ 
tion these States had about as large a 
crop of potatoes last year as they ever 
produced, so that it gives a good normal 
amount for this season even with the 
above mentioned shortage. The West is 
very heavy. Idaho has hundreds of cars 
of potatoes at points where they have 
never raised potatoes before. One thing 
we can figure on, and that is there will 
probably be no potatoes imported this sea¬ 
son. ALBERT MILLER & CO. 
Chicago, Ill. 
From what we can learn up to the pres¬ 
ent the potato crop in this section and 
other sections of Southeastern Michigan 
will not be any larger than that of last 
year. Blight, grubs and continued wet 
weather having cut down the expected 
yield, it looks to us as if the Government 
estimate of the crop is ’way too high for 
the entire country. h. b 
Holley, Mich. 
Deadlock Between Apple Buyers and Growers 
During the past two years there has been 
a marked change in the attitude of buyers 
and speculators handling the crop of Win¬ 
ter apples, which seems to have culminated 
at this time of writing In a complete dead¬ 
lock, buyers and growers being so far apart 
that nothing is being done. There must 
be some reason for this condition; if you 
ask the buyers, they say the growers are 
asking too much ; they talk about the im¬ 
mense crop in the country and Canada, 
and say that apples will be dirt cheap this 
Winter. It may be noticed, however, that 
they are not making any particular effort 
to get them even at the lower price. This 
condition is general throughout the coun¬ 
try. We have it here in Virginia, and it 
is remarked on by all the horticultural 
papers and trade journals. In my opinion 
this is nothing more than a great change 
brought about by the gradual change in 
methods of handling the crop. In the first 
place, ail the talk that has been made by 
the buyers and speculators about the rec¬ 
ord-breaking crop is proved to be abso¬ 
lutely without foundation ; as a matter of 
fact this is said regularly everv year, and 
usually commences as early as in June, 
and can be seen by the tone of the “trade" 
journals. The actual facts as collected bv 
the Governments of this country and Cau- 
ada, also by secretaries of various State 
horticultural societies and by some of the 
horticultural and agricultural journals, who 
have no reason for exaggerating conditions 
either way, show very different estimates. 
To my mind the real cause is from an 
entirely different reason. Up to quite re¬ 
cently cold storage conditions were some¬ 
what restricted, and farmers had not ap¬ 
preciated that they could use them; they 
had not been used to it, and after all stor¬ 
age was liard to get, for the buyers would 
engage most of it. Secure iu the knowledge 
that they could practically control the 
Winter prices, they could afford to buy 
freely, knowing that they would soli out 
at their own price late in the Winter. But 
in the last two years a great change is 
manifest. Cold storage accommodation has 
rapidly increased, there are now numerous 
storages all over the country, many put 
up by farmers’ companies, and the farmer 
has found out that he can keep his apples 
for Winter prices just as well as the buyer. 
I notice in several trade journals there has 
been mention of the amount of storage 
engaged by the farmers for their apples. 
Iu my opinion this is the cause of the dead¬ 
lock ; the buyer and speculator no longer 
can control the Winter markets ; they know 
that they have the farmer butting into the 
game, and they cannot tell how fast or 
when the farmers will put their crops on 
for sale. In plain language they are afraid 
to buy unless at such low prices that it is 
practically impossible for them to lose. 
Of course the farmers have been accus¬ 
tomed to selling their Winter apple crop 
as soon as they were barreled, or before; 
many were compelled to do so before frost 
came, not having any storage cellars on 
the farms. Those who had, sometimes kept 
them a while, but their number was not 
large, so the farmer got in the way of 
talking about what his Winter apples were 
“worth” in September or October; in fact, 
they were intrinsically worth nothing at 
that time, they were unfit to use and could 
not be sold in any market at retail. They 
were only a deal in future values, and this 
was not so difficult to determine, accord¬ 
ing to the size of the crop and the competi¬ 
tion among the buyers. In my opinion 
there is a great and radical change in 
process of being effected with regard to 
handling the Winter apple crop. I do 
not anticipate again seeing the buyers 
rushing around bidding for crops, but with 
each year 1 expect to see increasing cold 
storage facilities, and the farmer gradu¬ 
ally taking It as a matter of course that 
he w'ill store his apples and expect to sell 
along about Christmas or later. I may be 
w'rong in the w r ay I see things, but I have 
tried to explain my reasons in the fore¬ 
going lines, and I would be very glad to 
see some better fitted man with more ex¬ 
perience than I have .takq the subject up 
and show wherein I am right or wrong. 
WALTER WHATELEY. 
Sec. Va. Horticultural Society. 
