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Vf*l. J.XXVIII. 
Published Weekly by The Rural Publishing Co., 
333 W. 30th Hi., New York. Price One Dollar a Year. 
NIOW YORK, MAY. IT. 1919. 
/ * * ' • . . 
Entered as Second-Class Matter. Juno 28. 1870. at the Post 
Office at New York. N. Y.. under the Act of March 3. 1879. NO. 45o4. 
bought the cheese factories simply to get rhl of 
them. With no other means of disposing of milk 
there would he nothing to do but sell it to the dis¬ 
tributing company. 
FURTHER CHANGES.—Such, briefly stated, has 
been the evolution of the market side of the dairy 
business in much of tlie Hill section. In.the methods 
tn^uln rly 
buckwheat, helped 
sale of small grains, parti? 
a little. 
MODERATE RETURNS.—Rut the hill farmer has 
never become wealthy, even in these days of high 
Iuices. While most of us have avoided dire poverty, 
we have kept still further from the other extreme. 
We hear much in the city press just now about the 
“profiteering farmer.” 
- w -r 
*3£ 
A Purebred Product of the Hill Farms. Fig. 220 
of fanning and dairying great changes have also 
taken place. Better cows, better care and better 
feeding have greatly increased production. Diversi¬ 
fication in farming has added to the dairyman’s 
revenue. Diversification was necessary, because it 
would be ditlieult, if not impossible, to make a living 
on a small hill farm with just cows. Potatoes and 
beans were found profitable on many farms. Poultry 
and hogs added in a small way to the income. The 
I wish these people 
could know just how 
much the Hill fanner 
spends for luxuries, 
what liis bank account 
is, and how many his 
hours of idle pleasure. 
I wish they could feel 
the fatigue of long 
hours of labor, and the 
anxiety over weather 
and crops and prices. 
I wish they could go 
into the homes and 
really know how the 
lives of farm people 
are spent. Not that 
farmers as a class are 
severely oppressed or 
anything of the sort, 
but those who talk 
a h o u t “profiteering 
farmers” simply know 
not what they talk 
about. They seem to 
begrudge the farmer 
even moderate pros¬ 
perity. 
A FARM CRISIS.— 
To my mind a crisis 
has been reached for 
the hill farmer. The 
great world war has 
brought to a head con¬ 
ditions which were 
coming more or less 
rapidly even before the 
war. Help was scarce 
then. Now the farms 
have been drained of 
almost all the avail¬ 
able help. Those who 
have not gone to serve 
in the Army or Navy 
have been attracted to 
town and city by 
wages which the far¬ 
mer could not afford 
to pay. For years past 
more and more farms 
have been operated by 
tenants, and this nearly 
always means deterior¬ 
ation of the farms. 
, Then, too, the farmers 
have changed. With 
each succeeding generation they are becoming letter 
educated and better acquainted with the ways of 
the world. T.uxurles, such as telephones, daily 
newspapers, pianos, automobiles, modern improve¬ 
ments. etc., have come to he regarded as necessities. 
The farmer has come to think of these modern 
“frivolities’ as the just reward of his labor, and he 
will not go back to the old ways. Neither will 
“investigations” nor the scoldings of the city papers 
The Hill Farms and Reconstruction 
By One of the Hill Farmers 
A DAIRY SECTION.—For many years dairying 
has been the leading industry in what is known 
as the “hill section” of New York State. The reason 
for this is of course because of the peculiar adapta¬ 
tion of this land to 
dairying. Farms here 
are comparatively 
cheap. There is much 
rough land which pro¬ 
duces excellent pastur¬ 
age, hut which is not 
well adapted to ma¬ 
chine cultivation. The 
cultivated land is gen¬ 
erally well adapted to 
the growing of grasses 
and the earlier varie¬ 
ties of corn. Springs 
and brooks are usually 
abundant in the pas¬ 
tures. However, large 
towns and cities are 
not numerous, so the 
hill farmer must look 
for a distant market 
for most of his pro¬ 
ducts. 
IIUTTER AND 
CHEESE MAKING.— 
In the early days the 
products of the dairy 
were manufactured at 
home. Then as the 
number of cows in- 
creased and the mar¬ 
ket broadened with the 
increase of population 
*iud improved trans¬ 
portation facilities, co¬ 
operative bolter and 
cheese factories began 
to spring up here and 
there. In the course 
of time these factories 
became very numerous 
inch d. Now comes 
another Important 
step in the evolution 
of the dairy business. 
The local cheese and 
butter factories were 
at first owned by the 
patrons of the factor¬ 
ies. Rut gradually the 
original stockholders 
disposed of their stock, 
and the factories 
passed out of the 
hands of the farmers. 
Factory owners in¬ 
creased their holdings, 
and the business became more consolidated. Though 
an annual “cheese meeting” was held each Spring 
at the cheese factory, the control and management 
of the factory was really entirely in the hands of 
the factory owners. Finally, as the demand for 
market milk has become greater, many of the fac¬ 
tories have been bought by the big milk companies 
and have dropped out of existence as such. In 
■many cases the big distributing companies have 
