A Farm is Sold; What it Means to America 
Very few city papers will say a good word for the 
farmer and generally go out of their way to abuse him. 
The Philadelphia North American is an exception, and 
every little while we find an editorial on the subject, 
and The North American is noted for its editorials. I 
enclose one which appears today, thinking it may in¬ 
terest you. H. H.BEST. 
[That is true. The North American is probably the 
ablest daily in the country so far as its sympathy with 
farmers and its broad view of agriculture ts concerned. 
We print this dignified and thoughtful editorial as a 
good contribution to the study of American farming.] 
FAMILY of city dwellers last week bought 
a farm in Chester County comprising the 
following items: 
Seventy-five acres of fertile, tillable 
land, watered by five never-failing springs. 
A three-story 14-room stone house of 
mansion proportions, with running water. 
Commodious barn, with quarters for 25 cows and 
lined its history during the last three-quarters of a 
century. The house was built just before the Civil 
War, by a Pennsylvania German who was well 
known throughout the county as a solid, successful 
farmer. The land was worked by him and his de¬ 
scendants until two years ago, when it was bought 
by the young man who disposed of it last week. 
Stopping on a rise in a field carpeted with the 
green of young wheat, the sturdy plants telling of 
rich soil and good tillage, the visitors surveyed the 
farm and discussed the transaction from various 
point of view. One of them, who has had wide 
experience in building and real estate, asserted that 
the buildings could not be replaced today for less 
than $25,000; when they were erected, he said, they 
cost more than the price paid last week for the en¬ 
tire property. During a large part of the last half 
so striking an example was under observation, sig¬ 
nified a social change of far-reaching significance 
to the nation. 
Farming, he said, is the oldest and most basic of 
all industries. Upon this foundation civilization 
has rested since its beginnings, and must find there¬ 
in its chief support to the end of time. Were all 
other industries to be suspended or destroyed, agri¬ 
culture would still sustain the human race; were 
agriculture to fail, the earth would be depopulated. 
Our forefathers found on this continent a virgin 
soil incomparably fertile, which nature had been 
preparing throughout the ages for the advent of 
man. And essentially it is out of the soil that 
there have sprung our mighty industries and our 
great cities and our national wealth; for the coun¬ 
try’s rapid rise to industrial supremacy was made 
A Scene on the Hudson River —A Great Market Waterway. Fig. 2SS 
half a dozen horses, a granary and spacious loft 
and' supply of running water. 
Springhouse and other outbuildings. 
The price was $9,500. 
This farm lies within one hour by train or auto¬ 
mobile from the center of Philadelphia; within half 
a mile of one railroad station and within two miles 
of three others, all reached by improved roads. The 
house is only a few rods from a concrete highway, 
with an hourly bus service. Hardly more than five 
minutes’ ride away is West Chester, one of the most 
beautiful towns in the State, with churches, modern 
business facilities and a normal school and other 
educational equipment. 
The seller of the place is an energetic young farm¬ 
er, thoroughly conversant with land values in the 
vicinity. He was obliged to sell on' account of fi¬ 
nancial distress; he offered the property through a 
regular real estate agency, and received approxi¬ 
mately the price he asked. 
On the day the deal was closed, while piloting a 
small group of business men over the farm, he out- 
century the farmers on either side probably would 
have been glad to pay $75 to $100 an acre for 
available portions of the land, without any build¬ 
ings. The barn alone, said the expert, could not be 
built now for the purchase price of the whole estab¬ 
lishment. Estimating the buildings at only one-half 
of the total value, the land brings less than 50 per 
cent of its market worth a generation ago. 
During the period of this decline real estate 
values in West Chester, two miles away, have 
doubled, and in the immediate outskirts of the town 
probably have quadrupled. Real estate men say 
many property values in Philadelphia have doubled 
within the last 10 years, and suburban property has 
advanced 150 per cent. The $9,500 paid for this 75- 
aere farm, with its substantial buildings, would 
barely buy a two-story dwelling on a 16-foot lot in 
an attractive residential district of Philadelphia or 
its suburbs. 
One member of the party suggested that the 
startling and growing discrepancy between the mar¬ 
ket values of urban and rural property, of Which 
possible by abundance of cheap food. Without this 
there could have been no such development of na¬ 
tural resources, despite the powers of American in¬ 
ventive genius, mechanical skill and business ability. 
During the colonial period and long afterward the 
people of the sparsely settled land were engaged 
almost wholly in agriculture; manufactures as could 
not be produced in the homes had to be imported 
from Europe. Alexander Hamilton, one of the great¬ 
est constructive statesmen the country ever pro¬ 
duced, perceived that if the nation was to attain 
security and greatness it must develop industries 
which would make it independent of Europe, and 
would also establish an economic balance, providing 
consumers for the products of the soil. • 
That policy laid the foundations of industrial 
America. For nearly a century every factory 
erected was regarded as a blessing, a contribution 
to the nation’s material and cultural welfare. Dur¬ 
ing recent years, however, the ablest students of af¬ 
fairs have raised the question whether our indus¬ 
trial development has not proceeded so fur as to de- 
