THE CONSERVATIVE FATHER AND HIS 
PROGRESSIVE SON. 
Is the Boy’s Scheme Practical? 
One of the hardest problems of agricultural edu¬ 
cation conies up before the graduate of an agricul¬ 
tural college who goes back to work on father’s farm, 
it often happens that father is a good farmer—a 
practical man who has won his competence through 
1 ard labor and what we may call old-fashioned ideas. 
Perhaps he did not care particularly to have his boy 
go to college. It may be that mother—with woman’s 
dearer vision and ambition—was responsible for the 
boy's' college course. At any rate, he comes home 
after his years of study a changed man. College life 
has broadened him, taught him to think and reason 
along new lines, and shown him something of the 
true relations between the old home community and 
I find many disadvantages, chief of which are its 
large size, the hills and gullies, poor e quip ment in 
the way of fencing, ^ ra ' na ge>^d»aGi^j^J^^S^see 
little satisfaction ahead ift\f^jEawnH*»»s(md%e- 
turns are very poor ur^^^Jc^present $° 
gradually but power futlY^Jny miiidrtA Ween yfrni/g 
to intensive farming. /ATntosK^l thFTmes w^studfed 
about in college have \rece\^ d consid gjatfqrt, byf my 
mind always turns to osjrying, as i^W'st open¬ 
ing for intelligent farming!*^* Su tliij nT my problem: 
My ambition at present is to develop a small herd 
of the highest producing Jerseys possible, using the 
most scientific methods in breeding and caring for the 
same. My idea is to secure a 40-acre farm, stock it 
with good grades for a start and work up. I should 
like also to get a male and possibly female, from 
the highest producing strain of Jerseys in the land if 
I could afford it. I would hope to be able to keep 
in the manner I have indicated? Do you think the 
profits from the cream, surplus stock, breeding fees, 
hogs, and perhaps some poultry, would enable me to 
pay off my indebtedness in eight or 10 years? Don't 
you think by systematic advertisement and personal 
solicitation I ought to be able to make much from 
local breeding at large fees if I had a bull of high 
dairy qualities? All this and much more I should 
like to have advice on from a sympathetic friend. 
Give Us a Discussion. 
What would you advise in such a case if you 
could qualify as the “sympathetic friend” of this 
young man? Let us suppose this were your own 
boy. What would you tell him to do? Is his scheme 
practical or possible? Wherein is it wrong? Here 
we have one of the great problems of modern farm 
life in the relations between the conservative father 
TURNING THE FURROW’S ON A WESTERN NEW’ YORK FARM. Fig. 190 . 
the nation. Father may have kept up with the boy 
along the practical side of his studies, but the older 
man cannot view life just as the boy does. One 
must of necessity anchor his boat to the solid rock 
of past experience, while the other has no anchor, 
lmt would sail ahead to find a new harbor. Most of 
you have seen just such families trying to work out 
their problem. The conservative father is a little 
suspicious of these “new fangled” notions and not 
quite sure of the stability and judgment of his son. 
1 be boy knows what more progressive farmers are 
doing, and in the strong ambition of youth feels that 
father is a little slow and prejudiced. What is such 
a boy to do? We give below the actual statement of 
a young man who has taken a course at an agri¬ 
cultural college and is now back on the farm. Here 
ls ^' s Problem, and many of our people can read 
between the lines and get the whole story: 
A Young Farmer’s Problem. 
During my short stay at college all my courses 
’ me thinking about intensive agriculture, though 
was sure I would never practice much of it, as 
ni ' la, * ler has a large farm which he was proposing 
' cnt tlle a ' n( l which I thought that I might farm 
■ug as 1 lived. But now, after farming it a year, 
at least a dozen cows, and as many erffch of calves 
and yearlings beside the male and a team, by using 
silos and Alfalfa almost exclusively, after the system 
of the Illinois experiment. I would keep a few 
hogs, sell just the cream and the poorer cows, and 
make poultry a strong asset. I wish to make a success 
of this, not only to make a better living, but that 
the community into which I should like to move 
may also be benefited by the opportunity which I 
might afford for improving their own stock. Our 
section is just getting ripe for dairy development 
The cream separator has been in vogue for several 
years, the silo is just beginning to make its permanent 
appearance, but the real dairy farm, with herd records, 
scientific breeding and feeding, is scarcely practical 
at all. A large percentage of the farmers are ship¬ 
ping the cream from their few cows rather than 
churn it, as in the olden days. None seems ready 
to take the step toward making highly efficient herds 
as yet. Therefore, I think that a thoroughly scientific 
dairy farm with high records and good local adver¬ 
tisement ought to be a great benefit to the community, 
and pay. 
Now, the question is. do you think, muler the cir¬ 
cumstances, I could afford to borrow the capital (pro¬ 
vided I could get the security), buy and equip a farm 
and the progressive son. Probably in a small way 
this also involves many of the principles which must 
be thrashed out in the larger problems of society. 
\\ ill you play the part of sympathetic friend and tell 
us what you would do ? 
A GOOD FARM GATE. 
We have been using a gate for about 17 years that 
in my opinion has several good features I have never 
seen used on any other gate. The gate has been 
satisfactory to us, so we are convinced that others 
would make and use it if they knew of its merits 
and how to construct it, so I tell The R. N.-Y. about 
it. It is difficult to describe a contrivance of this 
kind on paper so that it can be easily understood, so 
I have made a model of the gate, posts, etc., which 
explains itself. I send you the model by express in a 
crate. When you set it up the half-inch board repre¬ 
sents the ground: the gate posts go in square holes in 
board, the pin at bottom of gate goes into hole in 
board where it is marked “flat rock.” 
GOOD POINTS.—Gate is not hinged on posts, but 
its weight rests on the pin pivot, which turns easily 
in the hole in rock This obviates most c? the tend 
enev to sag, which is the trouble with most gates 
hinged to post. The two parallel sticks at top of posts 
