39L3. 
THE GREAT NEED OF CASH CAPITAL. 
A Drawback to Profitable Farming. 
I read the article about the man who would like 
to take a farm, but had no capital with which to 
do it. I am a young man myself, running my fath- 
. THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
FARM HIRED MEN WITH CHILDREN. 
Another Side of an Everyday Problem 
In your editorial on page 1088 you print the text 
of a note received from a man who says he is a 
working farm manager, and is now looking for that 
kind of a position, but 
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.USING PITCHFORK ON SMALL BRUSH. Fig. 506. 
er's farm, as he is in poor health, and the farm is 
heavily in debt. I have run the farm for seven 
years and one of the great, if not the greatest, draw¬ 
backs that I have had is the lack of capital with 
which to farm. I know that if I could have the 
money with which to plant and grow the crops I 
could do better farming, and increase 
my profits to a great extent. I have 
found that to have the cash with which 
to buy supplies and take care of the 
crops was just the difference between 
a loss and a profit. No one who has 
not had the experience of trying to 
farm without capital can realize what 
it would mean to have farm credit. 
Now take myself for instance. I 
have the land, and if there was a way 
that I could raise the money with 
which to plant and grow the crops, giv¬ 
ing person or firm who supplies the 
cash, at a reasonable rate of interest, 
a claim on the crops planted to the ex¬ 
tent of the cash needed per acre for 
the crop, I could plant more and grow 
better crops, hire more help, live bet¬ 
ter, pay off debts and therefore help 
other people as well as myself. 
I would very much like to try the 
experiment next season on, say about 
10 acres of potatoes, four acres of corn, 
three acres oats and six acres of grass. 
I did not know but what maybe you 
would know a person or firm that 
would like to try the experiment with 
me by the way of supplying the cash. 
I firmly believe that when the Gov¬ 
ernment provides some way for the 
poorer class of farmers to raise money 
with which to plant, grow and harvest 
their crops it will do the farmer more 
good than anything that has been done 
before. It is no use to talk to a 
farmer about how he must grow this 
or that crop in this or that way, and 
provide no way for him to do it. For 
example, a farmer who has no capital, 
with his farm heavily in debt, and 
struggling along from year to year, at¬ 
tends one of the farmers’ institutes. 
He listens to the men tell about purebred stock, 
increasing the fertility of the land, how to grow 
better crops and so forth and then they stop. 
That man goes home discouraged, for he knows 
as well as they do that he should do these 
things, but he faces the cold facts that he cannot 
raise a cent and so cannot do it. They failed to 
give him the key to his troubles. IIow much better 
it would have been if after these institute workers 
had told about the wonderful profit from a pure¬ 
bred cow, they had said: “The Government stands 
ready to furnish you with money for such a cow 
provided you are suitable to own one and willing to 
comply with the term of payment,” or the same 
with the crops. Then you would see that it was 
up to the man: he would have his chance to make 
good his desires. After you have faced this subject 
lor a few years and have seen your profit slip away 
from you, for no other cause than not having that 
dollar at the right time, when you know it would 
be returned a hundred fold or more, you will soon 
see that it is a vital question with the farmers. The 
same problem is being solved in other countries; 
surely the United States cannot afford to trail be- 
bb'd Europe. r .t n 
finds it hard to secure 
one on account of his 
children, meaning, I 
take it, that people do 
not like to hire men 
with families. Then fol¬ 
lows your comment, 
which shows very high- 
minded and noble senti¬ 
ment. I agree with 
your statements, gen¬ 
erally speaking, but I 
wish to say that there 
are really two sides to 
this particular question, 
as well as most others. 
I am going to assume 
that you personally have 
not had much experience in hiring and living on 
farm with your men, one or more of them having 
large families. I have, and I wish to state em¬ 
phatically that in my estimation there is nothing 
more unpleasant than such a situation when the 
children of the men are not well brought up and 
FLOOR PLAN 
1296 
watching the columns of your paper, hoping I 
shall thereby get in touch with a good honest, in¬ 
telligent and industrious man, to help me carry 
the load. I am willing to pay well for the right 
man. Efficiency is the watchword nowadays in 
any kind of business, and the workers who are 
really efficient can secure good positions with 
good salary. But as you stated in your paper 
a short time ago. “They must be able to do the 
work themselves that they may be able to direct 
others in the doing of similar tasks, otherwise their 
title to farm manager or working foreman is not 
clear - M. L. L. 
R. N.-Y.—We have employed several families with 
children, and we realize that there are several sides 
to the question. We have rarely found the children 
particularly at fault. Their parents are usually re¬ 
sponsible for the trouble. Their children are not 
taught to “mind, ’ or to have respect for property or 
private rights. It is very easy to criticize and find 
fault with children. Most of us expect too much 
from them, but when the parents will control them 
a crop of children will help any farm. 
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CR050- SH/HON 
properly trained by their parents. On the other 
hand, when properly looked after by parents, it is 
pleasant to have them about. The average farm 
hand in this section thinks little about the bringing 
up of his family. They come up. like weeds, and 
on a large farm where many hands are required 
to do the work such 
children are worse than 
a nuisance. In fact I 
am about to let a man 
go who otherwise would 
be satisfactory except 
for the viciousness of 
his children. At the 
present there are, in¬ 
cluding my own family. 
24 children on my farm, 
aged from three months 
to 17 years. I am look¬ 
ing for a working farm 
manager to help me on 
my fruit farm, but 
would hesitate about 
hiring another man with 
largp family. I am CLEARING OLD 
A CONNECTICUT MAN IN CALIFORNIA 
I was much interested by the statement in The 
It. N.-Y., page 11.17, that German scientists had 
found radium rays to give much success in treating 
deafness, for I am one who lives in the borderland 
of the silence and such news comes near to me. I 
live with books and papers, and they 
talk to me of many things; of the 
present and past, nor do they have to 
perform painful vocal gymnastics to 
make me understand as do my human 
friends. I want to thank you for my 
share of the pleasure and instruction 
I get from The R. N.-Y. It is all good, 
but most of all I enjoy the little kinks 
and quirks of humor that "doeth me 
good like a medicine.” There are a 
good many readers of The R. N.-Y. 
here. Eastern people who ha-ve brought 
the love of their home paper with them 
and set it up with their other house¬ 
hold gods in a strange land. 
I came to Kern county from Con¬ 
necticut and am well satisfied with the 
change. I have a small farm in what 
was once the delta of the Kern River. 
The soil is very fertile and grows Al¬ 
falfa to perfection. From about 10 
acres I have cut 60 tons of hay this 
year, with one irrigation. Like other 
farmers, we get the short end of the 
stick, for the 3o-cent dollar is much in 
evidence—Alfalfa hay sells in the stack 
for $7 to $ v \ and the consumer 200 
miles away pays twice and three times 
that price. One remedy lies in cooper¬ 
ation. Another is dairying, that $S hay 
fed to cows would net $12 to $15 
a ton, for butter fat is worth 35 to 
40 cents a pound, and grade cows pay 
$S to $12 a month, but, the curse of 
the country from a dairy viewpoint is 
the dual-purpose cow—a grade Short¬ 
horn. this was a stock country origin¬ 
ally, and when the farmers began to 
produce cream, they took what was 
nearest to hand for the purpose. There 
are some fine Jersey herds and a few 
Holsteius. but the majority of the 
cows are grade and seconds. 
One man with a herd of grade Jerseys last year 
sold $20,000 worth of cream to the A. T. & S.' Fe. 
Labor is poor and costly. Few men are good milkers, 
and wages are $30 to $4o a month and board. I shall 
keep on selling hay. F w H 
ORCHARD. Fki. 507. 
c. .t. o. 
(See Base 1312.) 
