'1238 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
The little house in Bristol County, 
Mass., where I lived as a boy, is much 
the same as it was 50 years ago. We 
could not find the barn, but the house 
is practically unchanged, except that the 
old-fashioned brick oven has been taken 
out. My boys drew a bucket of water 
from the old well. The wooden drum with 
the big stone to counterbalance the weight 
o?f the bucket is still there. The big “air¬ 
tight” wood stove has disappeared and a 
coal burner takes its place. How well I 
remember those cold Winter nights when, 
at eight o’clock sharp. I made a run for 
bed! There Was only one warm room in 
the house. I would make a run through 
the cold kitchen up the narrow back 
stairs, through the west chamber into 
the little unfinished room where 1 slept. 
I used to undress as far as possible as I 
ran, and dive into bed to finish the oper¬ 
ation under cover. I took the boys over 
this well-known route, and showed them 
the big, dark hole under the roof. Many 
a night I have been wakened by the crack 
and snap of the timbers as the frost 
played with them. It seemed like foot¬ 
steps across the moon-lit floor, and no 
one knows how many grinning imp-faces 
I have seen in imagination peering down 
from that big, black hole! I used to get 
down under the covers and stay there. 
My boys could see nothing attractive 
about the old place, and of course they 
could not understand what these crowded 
little rooms meant to me. I presume it 
is just as well they cannot understand. 
These are the things which one genera¬ 
tion cannot hand along to another. 
***** 
The little farm has been kept clean and 
at work. I found the big rock or outcrop 
of ledge where we piled the stones as 
they were picked up. I remember when 
these small fields were so thickly studded 
with rocks that at least 30 per cent of 
their face was lost to cultivation. Uncle 
Daniel and I dug most of them out, and 
we had no aid of stump-pullers and 
dynamite. We just dug big holes around 
them and rolled them out and away on 
wooden rollers. Some of these rocks were 
of such composition that we could split 
them. We used to build a bonfire on top 
of the rock, and when it was good and 
hot dash on a few buckets of cold water. 
The sudden contraction caused by the 
chill would usually shatter the big fellow 
so that we could move it away. I saw 
some of the old hardheads which we split 
in this way just where we piled them on 
that ledge. As a result of this work most 
of those little fields are as smooth and 
clean as a prairie, and how that soil does 
respond to cultivation! I have no doubt 
this little farm has produced at least 200 
crops in succession, and I could take it 
next year and get the largest yield of all 
this period. The natural strength of this 
old soil in southeastern New England is 
astonishing. With anything like intelli¬ 
gent care it cab be made to outyield the 
richest soil of the Mississippi Valley, 
while farm products will sell for at least 
50 per cent above Western prices. Further 
than that, much of this soil is naturally 
adapted to growing the McIntosh and 
Baldwin apples. I doubt if any better lo¬ 
cation can be found. Yet. it must be said 
that farming as we old-timers knew it is 
dead or close to it in this section. 
***** 
Why? Men who believe, as I do, that 
where you can find soil naturally adapted 
to fine standard products, farming is the 
best business on earth, will naturally ask 
that question. Wm. N. Howard took us 
in his car all over the town. The roads 
are good, and every house along the way 
was neatly, painted and well kept. The 
few fields of cultivated crops were in good 
condition. We passed a good Grange hall. 
The country churches are well preserved, 
there was an evident smile of prosperity 
over the entire community. Passing 
through any such community in Central 
New York you would have said it Avas 
the most prosperous farm section you 
ever saw. But the truth is there are 
practically no farmers living there. Every¬ 
one has some outside job in town or in 
some factory. The “farm” is usually 
only a few acres along the road, where 
the rocks have been pulled out and the 
soil smoothed or drained. These roadside 
fields bloom like the rose, Avhile the rest 
of the land may be in timber or rough 
pasture. The money which supports these 
farms and maintains that smile of pros¬ 
perity comes out of the factories and 
towns. With a low-priced car these coun¬ 
try dwellers can quickly reach a railroad 
or drive direct to the factory where they 
work. Wages are high, and these people 
are usually thrifty. Their “farming”,, is 
done in idle hours, or through the help 
of hired labor. These people have most 
of the common comforts and pleasures 
of life. 
* * * * * 
It will be hard for a man who has 
always lived in a community Avhere farm¬ 
ing is the chief business to realize just 
how this plan has worked out. Even in 
my boyhood days the thing had started. 
Then we had a little room in the barn 
Avhere avc pegged shoes or braided straw 
through the Winter. The farms Avere 
(>ven then being neglected, though the 
outside Avork was brought to us. Noav 
the people go out after the work, and 
naturally there is less done on the land. 
Yet the people are thrifty and seem Avell 
contented. In the Plymouth Five Cent 
Savings Bank I saw a colored man draw 
out a big roll of money several inches 
thick, and you can hardly find a country 
community Avhich shows greater evidence 
of prosperity than the one avc rode 
through. When this strong, rocky land 
is cleared and drained you have soil which 
ranks with the most productive in the 
Avorld. The markets in these manufac¬ 
turing toAvns are the best to be found. 
New England cannot live and maintain 
her present position unless she can in¬ 
crease her output of homegrown food. 
Those things being true you might safely 
assume that there would be a rush of 
human energy into crop production—just 
as water will run down hill to fill up a 
lower level. But nothing of the sort 
seems to be happening in Bristol County, 
in spite of the evident logic of the situ¬ 
ation. Manufacturing and the sale of 
human labor to a factory for cash has 
the advantage over what the farm offers in 
indirect cash wages. The truth is that 
in this part of New England the spirit 
of farming is weak. It has become more 
fashionable to work in the factory and 
Avork a garden than to put. thought and 
labor into the farm. Mind dominates 
matter in such things. It seems to me 
that the leaders of New England thought, 
are blind in this respect, for there never 
has been any permanent success in manu¬ 
facturing in any section Avhere the people 
must depend on outside supplies of food. 
I should think it would be of the utmost 
importance for Ncav England to develop 
a higher regard for agriculture and a big 
increase in food production. If a man 
has reasonable capital, Avants to farm 
and is Avilling to work and stick to it, I 
should think there would be a chance for 
him in Nev\\ England. But can he or his 
family stand up against the social com¬ 
petition from factory A\ T ork? I frankly 
doubt if I could, and I do not think my 
boys Avould be satisfied on a farm in my 
old section. It. may be that some one 
Avho knows will come forward and prove 
that the present Avell-kept gardens really 
produce more than the old-time farms. 
That is possible, but it’s an argument in 
favor of farming. 
***** 
I oftex wonder what men liaA r e in mind 
Avhen after half a century of hard and 
strenuous living they go back to the 
“pent-up Utica” which confined their 
childhood. We often talk of the “good 
old times,” but honestly, were they such 
an improvement over the present? I do 
not care to live them over. Some strange 
things came to mind as I walked about 
the old place. Mr. Howard left his car 
in the road, just where Uncle Daniel tried 
out liis four-wheeled velocipede. You sat 
on a hind seat and worked a foot-bar with 
your feet and this turned the Avheels. It 
ran Avell on the barn floor, and Uncle 
Daniel took it out in the road to show 
off before the neighbors. It Avould not 
work on the soft ground, and another in¬ 
ventor’s dream faded nAvay. How Avell I 
remembered the day Ave were working 
the field for potatoes. The ground had 
been plowed by oxen. Then Uncle Daniel 
and I harnessed ourselves to a brush drag 
and hauled it up and down till the field 
was harrowed. Then avc took a long pole 
and tied weights and stones, which dan¬ 
gled behind it. We held up that pole and 
Avalked back and forth, marking out. the 
field for potatoes! While we Avere doing 
it Mr. Howard’s grandfather came along 
with an ox-team and laughed at us for 
being so slow! That was the year the 
potato beetles made their first appearance, 
and a man in our town claimed that it 
Avas a visitation of wrath because Massa¬ 
chusetts had gone Democratic! Those 
good old times had their good points, but 
they certainly seem old now. On the 
afternoon of that day Ave stopped at a 
field formerly worked by oxen to see a 
flying machine mount into the air, fly 
for miles around us and then come down 
like a bird. 
***** 
And inside the house I remembered the 
spot in the corner where I Avould sit on 
the cricket and listen to Uncle Daniel’s 
lecture on political economy. There was 
only one point about it. and that was the 
unpardonable sin of ever voting anything 
except the Republican ticket! As I re¬ 
membered I Avas almost ashamed to think 
that I once ran for Congress on the Pro¬ 
hibition ticket. But it would please the 
old gentleman to know what a sound 
beating I got for disregarding his political 
advice. And Aunt Mary Ann! As I 
stood in that little room I could see her 
August 23, 1010 
stern face with the long bony finger pre¬ 
sented like a pistol at the chunky little 
fellow in the corner. I can hear her hard, 
harsh voice as it comes back, through the 
years, unmellowed or unsoftened by time: 
‘"Are you doing right?” 
After all these years that old appeal 
to conscience makes me jump at the 
thought of several cloeed and locked doors 
and several sleeping dogs that line the 
way of life. But Aunt Mary Ann’s ques¬ 
tion had to do Avith my daily dose of 
sulphur and molasses. Every Spring we 
came to green grass a little “run down” 
and in need of a Spring tonic. And this 
we got in the shape of powdered sulphur 
mixed AA’ith old-fashioned molasses. I 
took it out of an iron epoon and licked 
the spoon clean at the end of Aunt Mary 
Ann’s bony finger. 
* * £ $ sjt 
In the “good old days” we believed in 
sulphur. We thought it cleaned the 
blood, and I continued to think so until 
a feAV weeks ago. That year, when Mas¬ 
sachusetts went Democratic and the po¬ 
tato beeetles came to gnaw the defeat in. 
we lost most of our potato crop. We 
had to substitute yellow turnips for po¬ 
tatoes. along with pork, beans and salt 
fish. We had those turnips boiled, fried, 
mashed and raw, and Avonderful to relate, 
that Spring avc felt less need of sulphur 
and molasses than ever before. Still, 
believing in sulphur, I did not account 
for it until years later I found that yellow 
turnips are rich in sulphur, and I put. 
two and tAVo together and proved that 
the turnips gave us the “sulphur tonic” 
day by day ! So A\ T hen Dr. Osborne began 
to tell us about those Avonderful vitam- 
ines in our food I thought I would try to 
display a little scientific knowledge and 
spring my turnip-sulphur theory on him. 
I Ie tells me that our “Spring tonic” Avorked 
not because of the sulphur but because the 
molasses contained vitamines! The tur¬ 
nips also contain these A’itamines in 
greater number than peeled potatoes, and 
that was the reason Avhy we felt, better 
on the turnip diet. So the discovery of 
those vitamniee and the application of the 
principle in selecting food has driven 
away many a “Spring tonic.” I looked 
into the little cupboard where the old 
dish of “tonic” was kept, and thought I 
suav the stain where Aunt Mary Ann 
knocked the cup over. Dr. Osborne has 
convinced me because I haven’t science 
enough to go up against him. But I 
Avould go far to witness an argument be- 
tAveen Aunt Mary Ann and Dr. Osborne— 
she to back sulphur and molasses against 
his vitamines! Give her the right to 
point that long bony finger in the debate 
and I would bo inclined to be sorry for 
the vitamines. 
it. av. c. 
Cletrac 
TANK-TYPE TRACTOR 
(Formerly known at the Cleveland Tractor) 
Plows on the heels of the Harvest 
The actual experience of farmers everywhere 
proves conclusively that wheat yields are increased 
from 5 to 8 bushels an acre by plowing immediately 
after harvest. 
But this is usually the hottest and busiest season 
of the year when men and horses tire easily. 
With the Cletrac Tank-Type Tractor you can 
actually plow right on the heels of the harvest —and 
do it so quickly that you will not interfere with cul¬ 
tivating, haying or other routine work. 
Through the most extreme heat the Cletrac con¬ 
tentedly and steadily does a job that would kill a 
team. It will work all day and all night if necessary. 
You can drive it unmercifully—and in return get an 
increased yield of better quality, that will often pay 
the whole cost of the tractor in one season. 
Prompt plowing after harvest enables your soil to 
soak up and store away moisture that would other¬ 
wise be lost. 
But remember the Cletrac does far more than 
merely plow. That is only the 
beginning of its Work. Its dis¬ 
tinctive tank-type construction en¬ 
ables it to go almost anywhere—particularly over soft 
plowed ground or moist or sandy soil where the 
average tractor would flounder or “dig itself in". 
All the power of the Cletrac is used to pull the im¬ 
plement. And because of its 600 square inches of 
traction surface it doesn’t leave two packed down 
tracks of earth behind it. 
The Cletrac is extremely economical to 
operate, using kerosene, distillate or gaso¬ 
line. Most owners are using kerosene or 
distillate. 
Send for our booklet “Selecting Your Tractor”. 
It will be a real help in solving many of your most 
difficult problems. And order early as we cannot 
promise prompt delivery later on. 
^Cleveland Tractor Co, 
19009 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, Ohio 
The largett producers of Tank- 
Type Tractors in the world. 
