484 
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T i ( M* 
March 27, 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE BUSINESS' FARMER’S PAPER 
A National Weekly Journal for Country and Suburban Home* * 
Established fSSO 
Piibllthed w**kly by the Rnral Pahliiblny Company, 3** ffnl 80tb 8trr*l. New Tarb 
Herbkrt W. Cou,rKawooD, President and Kditor. 
John J. Piixon, Treasurer and General Manager. 
Wm. F. DiUjON, Secretary. Mrs. E. T. Royijc, Associ ate Editor, 
SUBSCRIPTION: ONE DOLLAR A YEAR 
To foreign countries in the Universal Postal Union, $2.04, equal to 8s. Rd., or 
81b marks, or lOifc francs. Remit in money order, express 
order, personal check or bank draft. 
Entered at Now York Poet Office ns Second Class Matter. 
Advertising rates, 75 cents per agate line—7 words. References required for 
advertisers unknown to us ; and cash must accompany transient orders. 
“A SQUARE DEAL” 
We believe that every advertisement In this paper Is backed by a respon¬ 
sible person. We ose every possible precaution and admit the advertising of 
reliable houses only. But to make doubly sure, wo will make good any loss 
to paid subscribers sustained by trusting any deliberate swindler, irrespon¬ 
sible advertisers or misleading advertisements in our columns, and any 
such swindler will be publicly exposed. We are also often called upon 
to adjust differences or mistakes between our subscribers and honest, 
responsible houses, whether advertisers or not. We willingly use our good 
offices to this end, but such cases should not be confused with dishonest 
i ransactions. We protect subscribers against rogues, but we will not bo 
responsible for the debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned by the courts. 
Notice of the complaint must be sent to us within one month or the time of 
the transaction, and to Identify it, you should mention Tub Rubai. Nkw- 
YORKKR when writing the advertiser. 
C ORNELL University proposes “potato week” from 
March 29 to April 3. The suggestion is that 
during this time: 
The consumer might make a special effort to eat pota¬ 
toes prepared in various ways, and the wholesaler and 
retailer to furnish them at the lowest possible cost com¬ 
mensurate with a reasonable profit for handling them. 
The farmer, for his part, should aim to supply the pota¬ 
toes which he is now storing, at a price which will repay 
him for the cost of growing them and give him a return 
for his labor. 
Our part of the celebration will consist in eating 
fried potatoes for breakfast, baked potatoes at noon 
and potato soup at night. While, of course, this will 
not, of itself, relieve the situation, it will help. The 
scheme has been tried before with various farm pro¬ 
ducts and is a good feature of an advertising cam¬ 
paign. A good potato week helps make a strong 
market. 
* 
W E never before had so many calls for advice 
in regard to partnerships in farming. Hun¬ 
dreds of women apparently are planning to 
arrange with some one to run the farm on a part¬ 
nership basis. As a rule these women expect to fur¬ 
nish land, stock and most of the capital, and let some 
man do the work. We advise them never to enter 
upon any such agreement without having a good law¬ 
yer draw up a legal contract to be signed by both 
parties. Do not neglect this—or you will have a 
world of trouble. As for a basis of agreement, you 
cannot do better than adopt the plan we have so 
many times suggested. Divide the business into 
three equal parts—represented by real estate, per¬ 
sonal property and labor. Divide the proceeds pro¬ 
portionately as each party puts up one or more of 
these items. 
♦ 
T HERE is a brief statement on page 470 about 
the egg-laying contest now going on at Burnley, 
in England. One feature at least—that of fig¬ 
uring week by week the money value of the eggs— 
might well he adopted on this side. Mr. Lincoln’s 
six Leghoims are representing America, and we have 
every confidence in their ability to “do us proud.” 
There ought to be more American birds sent to these 
English contests. Here come Barron and Cam to 
this country to shake up our comfortable notions 
about hens and to wake up our breeders. Now let 
more of our home breeders cross the water and let 
the American lien show what she can do abroad. 
We suggest that some of our leading breeders get to¬ 
gether and organize a plan for selecting the best- 
bred pullets of half a dozen breeds and entering 
them at the English contests. The R. N.-Y. will 
gladly help in this. 
* 
We have been interested in your articles on honest 
packing, and wish to say that we have had several bar¬ 
rels of New York apples in the last few years, and that 
we have always found them to be of good quality and 
honestly packed; the last ones we got had the name of 
the man by whom they were packed stamped on the 
barrel. Yours for honest business, 
Iowa. n. J- SIEMS. 
W E are glad to print this. There have been some 
hitter complaints about New York apples, but 
we must all remember that one man finds 
fault wdiere 50 satisfied customers will say nothing. 
The great majority of New York growers are honest 
and fair. They give customers a square deal and 
take pride in doing so. The had reputation is given 
mostly by buyers who come into the State, buy the 
fruit on the trees, pack it to suit themselves and 
then get out. Customers who get this fruit find fault 
and stand ready to condemn anything that comes 
from New York. The great majority of consumers 
find New York fruit just as our Iowa friend de¬ 
scribes it, but they do not think it worth while to 
make report. 
/> 4 vt 
THIS RURAL NEW-YORKER 
WILL say for your paper it is just what the hard¬ 
working men need; someone to do the thinking and 
guide them. There is no class so easily swindled 
out of their hard-earned money os the liard-work- 
fug men. n. c. f. 
Ohio. 
We know just what our friend means and we ap¬ 
preciate it. We do not, however, want to do the 
thinking for our readers. On the other hand, we 
want to help them to do their own thinking. Prac¬ 
tically all the mistakes and tragedies of history have 
come as the result of permitting so-called “edu¬ 
cated” classes to do the thinking for plain, common 
people. When one man permits another to have any 
monopoly of thought he starts the machinery at 
work which sooner or later produces a slave and a 
master. It is only through thought that men are 
made free and fit to control the forces of society. 
The R. N.-Y. does its best to induce its readers to 
think for themselves. Most men do not like to think, 
yet if they would but realize it the habit of clear 
thinking and fair reasoning from facts is their only 
industrial salvation. We do not care to think for 
our readers—we want to think along with them. 
* 
EM EMBER the Kincaid bill! It is No. 064 in 
the New York Assembly. There has been a 
storm of protest over the effort to abolish the 
Food and Markets Department. Letters have poured 
into Albany by the bushel—and still they come. 
Keep right after them. If by any chance you have 
not written your Senator and Assemblyman about 
this do it at once. Let us make n sure tiling of this. 
In addition to help in killing this hill you will help 
make a needed demonstration of the fact that far¬ 
mers will stand up and fight for their rights. Such 
a demonstration is needed. It should he made over a 
question which cannot possibly divide farmers into 
political parties, hut which will give them a chance 
to put their most important problem right to the top 
of the list. That is just what this fight against the 
Kincaid bill does. Up and at them ! 
* 
Farmers that before they were 20 faced the miseries 
of camp life or a cavalry charge, men that married and 
ran in debt for farms and paid for them, brave men that 
broke steers and milked Cows in fly time, quail at the 
thought of soliciting orders of the fair sex of our towns 
and suburbs. The most forlorn man I ever saw was the 
man that failed in that line and got drunk to rest bis 
mind. k. 
HAT is from a grown-up man who has paid for 
a farm by obtaining the entire consumer’s dol¬ 
lar. It seems to be true that some of these men 
would rather face bullets than sell goods direct to 
women. We know one old politician who is said to 
have so much “nerve” that he has no nerves left, who 
as a young man had to be whipped by his father be¬ 
fore he would go up to a house where there was a 
group of girls and ask if they wanted to buy pota¬ 
toes and sweet corn. Perhaps the grocers and ped¬ 
dlers get their 65 cents of the dollar because they are 
brave enough to face the women folks. We wonder 
if these faint hearts are trained at home by the 
comments on agents often made by their wives. 
* 
I notice an advertisement in a recent issue of The 
Literary Digest of “Radium Brand Fertilizer.” Do 
you think I would be justified in paying from $130 to 
$2G0 per acre for fertilizer just because it contains 
“radium element,” when I can buy enough nitrate of 
soda, sulphate of potash and acid phosphate for an acre 
for one-tenth as much money? a subscriber. 
E touched up this “radium” fertilizer two 
months ago. Nothing has been demonstrated 
about this use of radium ores. The Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture can find no particular virtue in 
it. “Radio-activity” is what is claimed for it. You 
would better show your activity in getting away 
from the proposition before they raid your pocket- 
book. Our advice is to stay right by our old friends 
nitrogen, phosphoric acid and potash in their old, 
familiar forms, and save 90 per cent, of your money. 
But think of the humor of this situation. Our friend 
goes to a literary magazine which probably would 
not know nitrate of soda from coal ashes, and he 
also lives in a town which contains one of the best 
colleges and experiment stations in the country. 
Yet this institution is a prophet without honor. 
* 
On page 253, under title of “The Farmer and the 
Thief,” you have set forth a line of everyday facts, but 
I am more than surprised that a farm paper of your 
stamp would close such an article with the query: “We 
wonder if the situation is the same in other neighbor¬ 
hoods,” Of course, it is the same all over this country, 
and you ought to know it, I was about to say, and you 
know it; if you do not, you ought to. There are not a 
half-dozen farmers in this township who will stand to¬ 
gether on any one topic. G. h. w. 
HIS refers to a case where a farmer caught a 
thief in his orchard and carried the case to 
court. The neighbors of this farmer all went 
back on him and refused to testify. We asked the 
question in good faith, and now ask it again. In 
our own neighborhood farmers will come together 
and have done so again and again. Not all of them, 
but enough to make a good showing. There are 
other places where they will do the same. We know 
that some farmers will dodge responsibilities of this 
sort. That is one of the worst things about farm¬ 
ing. but we do not join in any such wholesale con¬ 
demnation as our friend desires. The R. N.-Y. 
knows better, for again and again the farmers have 
stood by us in time of trial—stood up openly when 
it meant much to them to do so. We have also 
known cases where men have tried to work farmers 
for some pet scheme or personal profit and then 
found fault because the farmers did not follow. 
There is no doubt, however, that the failure to get 
together and stand together is to-day the fundn men¬ 
tal weakness of farming. 
T HE movement to educate the public in an in¬ 
creased use of potatoes as food has gained 
great headway. It is being taken up by town 
and county papers, which are read by consumers. 
We learn in this way of deep-seated prejudices 
against the use of potatoes. A few of them are sug¬ 
gested on page 4S6. Doctors tell their patients that 
potatoes will “make them fat.” When women hear 
that they will run from potatoes and proceed to eat 
bread, great quantities of butter, sugar and other 
fat-making foods. The theory that potatoes are 
specially likely to produce fat has been exploded. 
They can be cooked in such great variety of ways 
that when properly balanced they will substitute for 
most other foods except meat. One great trouble we 
find in this campaign is the fact that most city 
dealers do not like to handle potatoes. The crop is 
bulky and perishable, and it is far easier for the 
grocer to tell his customers that a package of some 
prepared food contains more nutriment and is easier 
to cook. In spite of these handicaps the use of po¬ 
tatoes is increasing. There is only one way to carry 
out the plan, and that is to put the facts before con¬ 
sumers. The way to do that is to get the town papers 
to print letters from farmers. Yom can help in this. 
We have given you the facts and figures. Can you 
not write them in your own way * to the town 
paper? 
+ 
I claim that the consumer pays tile same, no matter 
what the farmer gets. A few years ago I was down in 
New York one day a certain week in the Fall when we 
gardeners at Newburgh were getting 10 cents a basket 
for tomatoes, and that same day I priced tomatoes in a 
store on 42d street, and 1 was asked 10 cents per quart. 
The farmers lose sight of this, and when one insists on 
getting a fair price to the farmer and a free market 
anywhere he is branded as cruel and selfish. Some day 
we farmers will awaken to the fact that getting together 
while we are alive is better than being buried together 
dead. C. o. w. 
HAT puts it. right. The price to the public is 
practically the same no matter what the far¬ 
mer receives. A trade paper in New York says 
it is “absurd” and wicked to state that the farmer re¬ 
ceives a 35-cent dollar. How does it figure this to¬ 
mato deal? On another page a woman states that 
she received $22 for 100 barrels of apples. A celery- 
grower in Western New York sent a carload of cel¬ 
ery and got his payment in postage stamps! We 
know a Florida man who sent 15 boxes of fine grape¬ 
fruit and had to send $4 to balance the account. Has 
anyone heard of getting celery or fruit at low retail 
prices? G. II. Powell finds that when California 
oranges are sold here the consumer’s dollar is divid¬ 
ed as follows: Retailer, 33 cents; jobber, eight 
cents; producer, 26 cents; transportation, 33 cents. 
We can easily fill an entire paper witli cases where 
the farmer received less than 30 cents of what the 
consumer paid. We have never known anyone ser¬ 
iously to deny it, except the commission men. 
* 
IXTY carloads of potatoes! That ought to lieln 
relieve the situation in some locality. These 
potatoes are for export—still another way for 
increasing a needed trade. Read about this on page 
480. Here is a sample of the work which the Food 
and Markets Department can do for farmers. It 
gives opportunity to get together and handle trade. 
Read this announcement at once! 
BREVITIES. 
The latest food novelty is “beetato,” a cross between 
the table beet and the potato! It is a dead beat with¬ 
out question. 
Do not forget to put some seed of Alsiko clover in 
with the Red. The Alsike will surely do well on the 
sour and low spots. . 
We would not advise seeding to grass and clover 
with peas and oats. In a wet, favorable season such 
seeding might pay, but usually the rank pea crop will 
smother the grass. 
A Goon way to settle the hired man question would 
be for the boss to go out and work as a hired man on 
several different farms. Let him know just what it 
means to be hired and 10 to one he would see himself as 
the hired man sees him. . 
