916 
The RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
June 21, 1924 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE BUSINESS FARMER'S PAPER 
A National Weekly Journal for Country and Suburban Homes 
Established 18S0 
P iblisbed weekly by the Rural PiibliKhinj Company. 333 West 30th Street, New York 
Herbert W. Collingwood, President and Editor. 
John J. Dillon, Treasurer and General Manager. 
Wm. F. Dillon, Secretary. Mrs. E. T. Hoyle, Associate Editor. 
L. H. Murpiiy, Circulation Manager. 
SUBSCRIPTION : ONE DOLLAR A YEAR 
To foreign countries in the Universal Postal Union, $2.04. Herait in money 
order, express order, pei-sonal check or bank draft. 
Entered at New York Post Office as Second Class Matter. 
Advertising rates, $1.00 per agate line—7 words. References required for 
advertisers unknown to us ; and cash must ./company transient orders. 
“A SQUARE DEaL” 
We believe that every advertisement in this paper is backed by a respon¬ 
sible person. We use every possible precaution and admit the advertising of 
reliable houses only. But to make doubly sure, we 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 
transactions. We protect subscribers against rogues, but we will not be 
responsible for the debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned by the courts. 
Notice of the complaint must be sent to us within one month of the time of 
the transaction, and to identify it, you should mention The Rural New- 
Yorker when writing the advertiser. 
Having been appointed on a committee to prepare 
plans and estimates for a district school, I am turning 
to Tiie II. N.-Y. for assistance. In response to a re¬ 
quest for plans made to the Department of Education I 
received a cut of a two-room school, the estimated cost 
of which was approximately one-fourth of the valuation 
of our school district. Did you not have some kind of 
a competition for the best planned rural school some 
time ago? If so, can I get a copy of some of these 
plans? I wish you would print in The It. N.-Y. the 
plan and a description of the most suitable two or 
three-room school building in the State. I am sure 
some reader of The It. N.-Y. would send it to you if 
requested. L. R. p. 
New York. 
N OW then, this gives us a good chance to show 
the value of the Rural School Improvement 
Society. We have not had any competitive plan for 
school designs, but we start right now to ask our 
friends for suggestions. There are already some 
excellent schoolhouses in the country which do not 
require “one-fourth of the valuation of our school 
district” to erect. We want simple plans for small 
schoolhouses which will meet the needs of the com¬ 
munity—from the standpoint of the people who 
must pay the taxes and provide the children. Here 
is a chance for intelligent members of the Rural 
School Improvement Society to put into concrete 
shape their ideas of what a district schoolhouse 
should be. We have said that our country people 
are capable of planning such things, and we believe 
it. Now help us make good on the statement. 
I* 
EORGE K. HOLMES, Statistician of the Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture, says: 
Farm labor became more effective in crop production 
in the United States from 1910 to 1920 by about 18 per 
cent, or nearly one-fifth. By means of more and better 
machinery, by means of time saved and devoted to ef¬ 
fective work, by actually working harder or longer 
hours, and in general by economy of effort, the ratio of 
crop production to farm workers advanced about 18 per 
cent in the 10 years. 
This was noticed in New York State. While farm 
population has declined, total crop production has 
increased. The only reasonable explanation is that 
the average individual worker has become more 
efficient. There has been some changing of crops as 
farmers learned by experience that certain products 
did not pay. The use of tractors and other new 
farm machinery has helped, and so has the use of 
improved seeds and stock. Farmers are also learn¬ 
ing to plant on the best acres of their farms and let 
the back fields go to grass and grain. It is a form 
of readjustment into which most farmers have been 
forced by circumstances, and they have met the situ¬ 
ation well. Without any question the power of the 
individual to produce farm crops has been increased. 
sk 
V IRGINIA apple growers recently met and start¬ 
ed plans for handling the Virginia crop to best 
advantage. 
1. The organization of the growers into convenient 
sectional groups for the purpose of standardizing the 
packing, barreling and grading of A’irginia apples in ac¬ 
cordance with the Federal and State inspection laws 
and under the supervision of Federal and State inspec¬ 
tors, so that buyers will know exactly what they are 
getting in purchasing a barrel of Virginia trade-marked 
apples under official seal. 
2. The appointment of a committee, headed by State 
Senator Byrd, to devise ways and means for advertising 
the Virginia apples for their flavor and quality, as well 
as for their guaranteed pack. This campaign will be 
along the lines adopted by the Pacific coast apple in¬ 
dustry. 
The meeting was informal, but these growers real¬ 
ize that with the flood of fruit coming this year only 
the highest quality and packing will command profit¬ 
able sale. In addition there must be effective adver¬ 
tising. Emerson said that if a man would produce 
a superior mousetrap the world would make a beat¬ 
en track to his door. But there would be no track 
unless he advertised and let the world know that 
his trap would catch mice. It is much the same with 
apples. The Western growers have advertised until 
the public believes there is nothing like the Western 
fruit. They will continue to believe that until they 
are “shown.” They must be shown by advertising 
of some sort. 
* 
E might as well hunt for stars on a dark night 
or for little bits of hope in a time of gloom, 
and the truth is that this wet season has given us a 
remarkably good stand of Alsike clover. We use 
Alsike because repeated experience has shown that 
on our soil Red clover and Alfalfa, and usually 
Sweet clover, will not prosper without heavy appli¬ 
cation of lime. In an apple orchard lime seems to 
be of little use except for growing cover crops of 
legumes. Alsike is one of the best of these, and will 
grow on a rather acid soil. Last year we lost most 
of our Alsike seeding as a result of the drought, and 
it meant the loss of several hundred dollars. This 
year we find the little plants coming in all over the 
rye and oats, and it is a good sight to see. It may 
not mean any great income this year, but it does 
mean much for the future—and farming is a busi¬ 
ness of futures—more so than most other lines. 
* 
E are coming back to the use of the old-fash¬ 
ioned weeder this year, and find it useful as 
ever. Just why this scratching and kicking imple¬ 
ment ever went out of use is a mystery. Z. Breed, 
who invented or designed the tool, took for his model 
the claws of an industrious hen scratching in the 
garden. His first weeder was a light plank with 
holes bored through it so that a set of limber sticks 
could be inserted. With horse in the shafts of this 
plank and the ends of these sticks in the soil, the 
implement went scratching and jumping through the 
soil, breaking the crust and kicking out most of the 
small weeds. That was the original; since then 
many changes have been made in the teeth and man¬ 
ner of attaching them, but the principle of scratch¬ 
ing the good old earth with a limber finger remains. 
The new tool was very popular at first. At one time 
it could be found on nearly every farm at seeding 
time, or when the corn was coming through. The 
teeth seemed to have some sort of intelligent human 
habit of avoiding the cultivated crops and ripping 
out the weeds. Then for some reason the weeder 
passed out of use, and was rarely used. The other 
day we had occasion to put chicken manure on the 
corn, and some tool was needed to work this manure 
lightly into the ground and kill the first little weeds. 
A light peg-tooth harrow did not quite do the work 
we wanted, so we got out the old weeder. It worked 
like a charm; easy for the horse, killing millions of 
weeds, lightly scratching in the manure, and doing 
no injury to the corn. It was like some old friend 
coming back from the discard to show us that it was 
better than ever. We now intend to work the corn 
three times with the weeder before using the culti¬ 
vator, and also to put in buckwheat and clover. In 
these days when one man’s work must be stretched 
out to cover as much space as possible, and do it 
well, the -weeder will prove a great help. Its use 
never should have been given up. It would pay to 
have a weeder of giant size to follow the tractor. 
* 
HE school trustee who asks, on the first page, 
just where he stands under the school law, 
wonders how he came to be elected. In some of 
the districts it came to be “an unwritten law” to 
elect the last man to move into the district, or the 
last man to be married. Less than usual of that was 
done this year, for most of our country people know 
that the school problem is the most serious public 
question they have to face. The statement of the 
duties and powers of a trustee given this week 
shows that he is held closely in check in financial 
matters. He should be careful not to exceed the 
limit of expenses made by the district meeting. Yet 
here is a man who sees clearly that certain improve¬ 
ments ought to be made, even though the annual 
meeting refused them. Here is a good chance for 
real leadership in that district through the exercise 
of patient and persistent determination. Our advice 
to him is to make a careful study of just what is 
actually needed; work out the cost accurately, so as 
to have the figures well in hand. Then call a special 
meeting of the district, after explaining to the more 
progressive people just what is needed and what the 
cost will be. Get up before that meeting and tell 
frankly just what is needed and how you want to 
do it. Ask the meeting to make a needed appropria¬ 
tion and authorize you to put the work through. 
The chances are that they will vote something in the 
way of help if you can put the case before them dip¬ 
lomatically. If they will not do it, organize the 
more enterprising men and women into a local 
branch of the Rural School Improvement Society, 
and get them to raise what they can personally or 
through entertainments—'and make a start. This 
improvement society was started to help in just such 
cases, and it can do untold good for local improve¬ 
ment. The carrying through of such a plan cheer¬ 
fully and persistently will constitute real leader¬ 
ship of the finest and most useful type we can think 
of. Try to make these objectors realize that a dol¬ 
lar invested now in these local improvements may 
save the district the expense of $100 later to pay for 
some educational fad or experiment made possible 
by the failure of the district to do its duty now. 
* 
RICH man has given $5,000,000 to a great uni¬ 
versity, and the daily papers announce the fact 
in spreading headlines on the first page. A farmer 
that we know of took eight neglected children into 
his home. He fed and clothed and reared and 
trained them through long and weary years. He 
gave them all healthy bodies and sound characters. 
Some of them had college education; all have grown 
up to be good citizens, clean and useful. It re¬ 
quired practically all of this man’s earnings to care 
for and educate these children. He gave them all 
he had, and died comparatively poor, yet blessed 
with honors such as seldom come to mortal man. 
Yet there were no great staring headlines announc¬ 
ing his death—no long and eloquent story of his 
successful life. For he was not a “success” as the 
unthinking world has given meaning to the word. 
And yet, as between this plain obscure farmer and 
the wealthy philanthropist we think the farmer 
was the greater and more successful man. We think 
he did more for his country, largely because he gave 
himself rather than his money. When a man gives 
himself to his country in this way he does not accu¬ 
mulate a great fortune, because his earnings are dis¬ 
tributed as he goes on to make life more endurable 
for those who are about him, and from whose labor 
his fortune would be taken if he made one. Per¬ 
sonally we do not consider that the great univer¬ 
sities need these fortunes half as much as struggling 
individuals who need a little money in order to es¬ 
tablish a home. If we had five million dollars the 
last thing we should think of would be to give it to 
some great university already surfeited with an en¬ 
dowment. We should lend and invest that money in 
such a way that worthy tenants and hired men with 
families might become freeholders of land. We need 
independent freeholders more than we need depend¬ 
ent universities. 
HERE have been many requests for accurate re¬ 
ports concerning apple conditions in Western 
New York. With this late season we are not able 
yet to give definite facts, but one correspondent gives 
this report: 
Yesterday I took a trip through Wayne, Monroe, 
Orleans and Niagara counties. In Niagara County 
everything has blossomed full—apples, I mean—except¬ 
ing Baldwins. In some places Baldwins are full and 
other orchards not anything. They are lighter in Ni¬ 
agara County than in either of the other counties. 
This is true of all the counties that Baldwins that 
bore heavily last year are light this year, and those that 
were light last year are heavy this year. All other 
varieties of apples are very full. They report in dif¬ 
ferent counties that Baldwins are light, but there are 
more Baldwins than they expected there would be. 
Sour cherries blossomed very full through all coun¬ 
ties, and are setting full; pears blossomed heavier in 
Wayne County than in any of the other counties. Ni¬ 
agara seemed to be lightest of any of them, and still 
they had a nice blossom. It is a little too early to tell 
about the setting of- the fruit. 
Brevities 
A great increase in New York population—two and 
a half million of young shad will be planted in the 
Hudson River this year. 
The campaign for an increased trial of Soy beans has 
succeeded. There will be more of these beans planted 
in New York than ever before this year. 
It is true that private property can be condemned for 
public use, but the value of the property must be paid. 
The hitch usually comes in trying to determine the true 
value. 
While the minister in his sermon referred to “these 
refreshing showers with which we have been blessed,” 
th man in the pew thought of his corn under water in 
the low fields. 
Remember that no one can compel you to insure your 
hired help against accident compensation. It is on 
much the same principle as insuring your house or 
other property. You take a chance one way or the 
other. 
Some years ago a certain dairyman spent more than 
two hours each day hauling milk to the creamery with a 
slow horse. Now he makes the round trip in half an 
hour, using a light truck. What he does with the 90 
minutes thus saved has to do with profit from the farm. 
The New York law holds that a lower proprietor is 
under no obligation to take care of the surface water 
of his adjoining upper proprietor, and may improve his 
lower land, though by so doing he prevents the flow 
of the surface water on his land from his upper neigh¬ 
boring proprietor to the latter’s damage. 
