Top- Dressing 
Talk No. 1 
The sunshine 
of 10,000 years ago — 
W HEN yon burn a lump of coal, it warms 
you with heat stored up by the sun¬ 
shine of far-distant centuries. For that lump 
of coal once formed part of a tree in the 
forests of the Coal Age—a tree fostered by 
the same sun which rises and sets today. 
If, instead of simply burning that lump 
of coal, we treat it by modern chemical 
methods, we get not only heat but nitrogen 
-—nitrogen that the Coal Age tree absorbed 
as plant food centuries ago. 
This nitrogen, most readily available in 
Sulphate of Ammonia, is recognized as one 
of the finest crop fertilizers in the world. 
From the reserves of Nature’s warehouse, 
the fertility of prehistoric ages is made to 
serve the farmer, vegetable grower and fruit 
grower of today. 
The most available form of Sulphate of 
Ammonia is Arcadian Sulphate of Ammonia, 
kiln-dried and screened so that it is ready 
for immediate application to the fields. 
Write for free bulletins which show you 
how to increase your farm profits with 
Arcadian Sulphate of Ammonia. 
The Igfjillb Company 
Agricultural' Department 
New York, N. Y. 
Berkeley, CaL 
Atlanta, Georgia 
Medina, Ohio 
f A Special Holiday Offer 
TO 
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American Agriculturist, December 27 , 1924 
Service Department 
Have You Seen These Missing People? 
N O work which American Agricul¬ 
turist does brings us any more 
real happiness than what we are trying 
to do through this Service Bureau. We 
wish it were physically possible for you 
to sit with us for a couple of hours in 
the morning when thfi ‘Service Bureau 
mail comes in and read with us the 
many letters that come right from the 
hearts of our people. Sometimes you 
would smile, but more often you would 
be saddened; and if you were to read 
the mail for a month, you would be 
amazed at the large variety of human 
problems our folks bring to us for help. 
.The happiness comes when we are able 
to be of some service. 
As an example of the many different 
kinds of trouble which overtake the 
members of our great family, we are 
printing a few letters on this page in 
which*we are sure you will be interested. 
First, there is the case of Mrs. Bertha 
Hunt, of Cuba, New York, who writes: 
“Will you please try to help me 
locate my husband and boys wher dis¬ 
appeared from my home at Bolivar, 
New York, about three months ago? 
“The younger boy, whose name is 
Bruce Hunt, is aged five years, has blue 
eyes and light hair; the other, Ned 
Hunt, is aged seven, has blue eyes and 
dark brown hair. My husband, Charles 
T. Hunt, is six feet tall, weighs 240 
pounds; has brown hair mixed with 
gray, and is abQut 58- I believe Mr. 
Hunt is mentally unbalanced. 
“Please help a desperate mother. My 
boys need me, I know, and if they long 
for me as I long for them, their little 
hearts must be broken.” 
We know how every mother’s heart 
will ache when site hears of this tragedy, 
so if by any chance you should have 
any clue to these missing ones, please 
write to our Service Bureau im¬ 
mediately, giving all of the facts. 
Then here is another liuman document 
which is illustrative of the personal 
problems that are brought to our atten¬ 
tion. The letter from the subscriber 
reads: 
“Is a husband responsible for debts 
contracted by his wife before marriage? 
I have a claim against a party for work 
I did for her before her marriage. She 
says she will not have to pay it as she 
has no income of her own now, and 
that her husband is not responsible for 
any debts before marriage.” 
-It stands a mere laymen well in hand 
not to-get mixed up in marriage contro¬ 
versies, so when this letter came, we 
immediately referred it to our lawyer. 
He wrote our subscriber as follows: 
“Under the old common law system, 
upon marriage, a man and woman be¬ 
came one, the man being the one. All 
of her property became his. She re¬ 
tained nothing, not even a smattering 
of freedom. In those good old days, 
the husband was' responsible for the 
wife’s debts, no matter when con¬ 
tracted. • 
“But in 1882, she rebelled, and since 
that time she has gradually reached the 
ascendency. No longer does her prop¬ 
erty become that of her husband on 
marriage. No longer must she promise 
to obey. No longer can friend husband 
dictate her every activity. Hence, since 
he has lost his power of control, his re¬ 
sponsibility has decreased by way of 
compensation, and he is now liable only 
for debts contracted by the wife as his 
agent or for debts contracted by her 
for necessaries during marriage. We 
therefore regret to advise you that the 
husband in your case cannot be called 
upon to pay the claim. The wife, how¬ 
ever, is still liable.” 
Here is another letter that gives an 
experience that is very common and be¬ 
cause it is liable to happen to any of 
us, it is worth commenting upon. One 
of our own women subscribers wrote the 
Service Bureau as follows: 
# 
“In reading about your Service Bu¬ 
reau, I became interested and wondered 
if you could help me. On October 28th, 
I had an interview with a very fluent 
employee of the Education Association. 
He pictured to me a wonderful propo¬ 
sition whereby I could earn $350 during 
the first hundred days, $500 during the 
second hundred days, and $650 the third 
hundred days. He said I had the capa¬ 
bilities of earning much more. The 
picture was that of interviewing moth¬ 
ers with children of schoool age and 
placing in their hands a copy of Vglume 
Library which was rendering them and 
our country a real service. 
“In actual truth, I would only be a 
book agent, going from house to house 
selling a book that would probably never 
be used a dozen times a year. It sound¬ 
ed great when they told me” (Editor’s 
Note: It always does!) “and I signed 
the contract depositing $5.50 for my 
outfit which consisted of one sample 
book. 
“When I thoroughly understood what 
I had to do and had to give eight hours 
a day to this work, and many other 
desirable facts, I went to them and 
asked them to release me from my con¬ 
tract. They refused to do it, said I 
had signed my contract and had to go 
on with my training. I had doctored 
for two years for nervousness and was 
getting better, but this trouble has 
about put me back to where I was two 
years ago. I feel as if I would go 
insane if I did have to go on with this 
work. 
I would like to know if they could 
force me to that contract.” 
\ ’ . , 
We were still working cn this case, 
but do not have much hopes of doing 
anything with it, because the agent was 
cunning enough to get a signed contract. 
There used to be a pretty good piece 
of advice which was often quoted to the 
effect that all persons should always be 
very careful of what they signed. This 
can be carried so far as to he foolish. 
Refusal to sign certain self-evident 
documents might hold up some good 
work. But when a stranger holds out 
some glowing proposition like the above 
and wants to get your name on a con¬ 
tract with undue haste, tell him to call 
around the next week if it is so import¬ 
ant, then investigate the matter and you 
may be ready to set the dog on him 
when lie returns. There are a hundred 
and one sales schemes, a lot of them like 
the above, which involve some book¬ 
selling plan, and there are few of them 
that are any good. 
In the letter that follows another kind 
of complaint that we have called atten¬ 
tion to a good many times, but are do¬ 
ing so again because farmers arc con¬ 
stantly "losing money through selling 
produce to unreliable dealers. 
“We wish to thank you most fervent¬ 
ly for collecting that unpaid check of 
Harry Blum, for a case of eggs. He 
would never have sent it himself, I am 
sure. 
“We knew he was unlicensed; but as 
he paid several cents per dozen above 
others, we took the risk. Many big egg 
producers do ship him and we have 
never heard of a complaint I sup¬ 
pose in a way, it was partly our fault 
Anyway, we certainly appreciate what 
you did and thank you again. 
“Your tax fight is great, too. We 
bank on what you publish.” 
All we need to say in addition is to 
repeat that- it is dangerous business 
selling any kind of produce to unlicensed 
brokers and commission mert. Lists of 
licensed dealers in all kinds of produce 
are being published from time to time 
in American Agriculturist. 
Another thing in the above letter 
needs some comment It is very risky 
to sell to dealers who promise 'to pay 
above the regular market prices. More 
often than not, such dealers might come 
through in good shape two or three 
times and then fail to pay a large num¬ 
ber of customers. When things get too 
warm, they close up their business and 
open again under a new name and ad¬ 
dress. 
