The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 21, 1919, Page 12

i { i e T TS VR L RS e S . and how little they’ll do for the town. _ spending their declining years on the ‘Move to the City Has Earned Right to Enjoy Conveniences of Town, Says One Writer. BY MRS. SAM DEAN NE sees so many articles, espe- cially in farm papers, advis- ing the retired farmer not to move to town that I am moved to rise up and ask, “Why shouldn’t he move there if he so desires ?7” After an old farmer has rais- ed grain and stock and so on all his life and he wants to move into the town he has helped create, you, Mr. Editor of some little farm journal, rise up and tell himn how much better off he’d be on the farm! He makes a poor citizen, you say, and he isn’t interested in building up the town. Of course, you forget that if it wasn’t for him and hundreds like him you wouldn’t have any town to build up! I wonder sometimes if one of those same editors were set down on a farm for just one long, cold winter and made to stay there and “pull teats” and clean barns and pump water day after day if he wouldn’t be longing for the - day when he could move into town! Perhaps he’d rfialize that there was another side to the question then. a To be sure, many a retired farmer will be happy to build a tenant house on the farm, rent it and remain to the end of his days in the old home. It has its advantages and if he and his old wife love their old home so much that they wish to stay there, well and good, let them do so, but for goodness sake, if they are tired of farm life (and there are a few disadvantages to it, farm papers notwithstanding), let them move to the town or city if they wish and enjoy the advantages that they have gone .without these many years. Stop meeting them with “Shoo, shoo, back to the farm with ‘you—this is no place for you.” Stop howling about what poor citizens they make They’ve done more for that town, if it’s their home town or any other for that matter, than a whole lot of edi- tors have. Without them there’d be no town. There are two sides to every story. It’s all very well to talk of how the aged farmer and his wife will enjoy old farm, of how they’ll beautify it and build it up. Maybe they will— that will be all right, too—but not long age I was talking to an old lady who is nearing her eightieth year. With % the exception of a few years her entire married life, and that’s by far the longest part of her life, has been spent on a farm. Her life has not been ‘very easy. She says, “As I loeok back over my married life, the one thing that looms up biggest of all is the hard work—hard work and no conveniences—I never lived in a modern house except the few years we lived in town. “The first 20 years of my married life, it was a baby every two years and hard work all the time, and always and always a hired man to cook for. The hired girl problem was nil—there was no such ani- mal. My mother or younger sister came in to care for me and do the work for a couple of weeks when the new baby came. I seldom had any hired help. Of course, I had to stay at home most of the time.. Even when the babies had grown up I did not get out much, for I was broken down in health and not able to go, especially in the winter. I have always dreamed of ‘the time when we could retire and move to the city and live in a modern house. There are only two things of all I planned for that I really long for yet, one is a bathtub, and the other to be close to church, so that I may go whenever I am well enough to do so.” Not much to ask for in the way of comforts in one’s old age, is it? Just a bathtub! True, they - could have one on the farm, but there is no running water and her husband doesn’t see the necessity of it. And to be mear church. But ye editor says automobiles bring church right to our door! Not for real old people in the winter time they don’t, and the days are much longer for them than for us who are young and strong. Poor old lady, so tired of always staying at home! Her husband is hale and hearty, he enjoys his farm work and the day B THE RETIRED FARMER—WHERE SHALL HE LIVE? We received an interesting letter from Mrs. Sam Dean the other day. It was so interesting, and raised such an im- portant question, that we showed it to another farm woman and asked her * what she thought of it. . She agreed with Mrs. Dean, in part, but not alto- gether. So we asked Mrs. Olson to write her ideas, also. She did, and we held Mrs. Dean’s letter to be printed at the same time. Here are the two letters. Read them and then write us what your OWN opinion is. is never too cold for him to go anywhere he chooses. He doesn’t care for the modern conveniences she would so much enjoy, and while he does everything to make her happy and comfortable he thinks they can not afford the expense of putting in those things. They will leave a goodly sum to their chil- dren, however, that might better be spent making their declining years comfortable. ‘They could easily own a modern little home in town—he could have a few farm things about him to keep busy at, and then they could attend church. There is a vast difference to old people between three miles and three blocks. Many a farmer’s wife can count. on the fingers of her two hands the really good concerts or lectures she has attended in I ' A MODERN FARM HOME | The house pictured above is one of the type of farm homes now being built in the Northwest. ernly equipped, has all the beauties of any house in any of the nearby towns and is supremely comfortable. The question discussed on these pages is: Is it better for a farmer to remain on his land after he has retired from active farm duties than to move to the city and enjoy This one is the home of a South Dakota farmer. the comforts and- conveniences of the town? her married life. Yet in this world there are mu- sicales, concerts, lectures, public libraries full of good books, and the old lady I was speaking of would be happy if she just could go to church services! Yes, if you have prospered sufficiently you may have a modern home right on the farm, but you can not get out much in the winter in your old age and when one has put in so many winters of their life strictly at home, they would like to make up for lost time on some things. They could stay right on the farm though and oversee their tenant, see that things are going right —yes, they could and many of them do, but do you think that all farmers care for is farming? Do you suppose, Mr. Editor, who is forever harping “Stay on the farm, stay on the farm,” that we do not weary of staying there? Especially we farmers’ wives? For my part I would love to see all old ladies, especially those who have been farmers’ wives, comfortably situated in modern homes in the town of their choice, where they could enjoy at- tending the many, many things they missed while Taising their families and living on farms. As.for the farmer himself, he ought to enjoy a rest from the hard work and the advantages that city life of- fers. If any one has earned a right to it, he has. If we could keep all farm children on farms and if retired farmers never moved to the city or city people to the farm, how long would it be before we -had two distinct classes of people in America who were perfect strangers, yes, aliens, to each other? Our farmers would be like the peasantry of Europe. We have been fighting for democracy. It is only by mixing and fusing of race and class that we maintain a democracy. It comes near enough to being caste and class right now. | PAGE TWELVE ' sanitary. plumbing. Stlay on the Farm Can Equip House With All Improvements of City Houses, Another Holds. : BY MRS. ELLA OLSON RS. DEAN asks, “Why shouldn’t - a farmer move into town?” I will answer her by asking an- other question, “Why should he move?” What Mrs. Dean says about the hardships.suffered by many farm women is all’ very true. But life on the farm can be made easier. o For a fraction of the money that is needed to buy a new home in town a progressive farmer can - equip his house with electric lights, bathtub and The strongest argument in favor of moving to town, it seems to me, is one that Mrs. Dean did not mention at all, and that is to get better schools for our children, but the way that North Dakota rural schools have been built up, by the consolidation plan, in the last few years is very encouraging and soon we expect to have as good schools in the country as they have in the cities. There is bound to be a difference of opinion as to whether a farmer should move to town or not. If he wants to and can afford it and has considered everything carefully, he certainly has earned the right to move, regardless of what the editor of the farm paper or city folks generally may say. But it seems to me that if the farm- er, in his old age, can afford to buy a new place in town and rent out his farm to tenants, he could have afford- ed, years ago, to have put in plumbing and modern conveniences for his wife and family and to have built up on the farm just as comfortable a home as he can find in the city, and with less cost. : He can give his children some con- veniences and benefits and a pleasant life, so that when they grow up they will be willing to stay on the old place, instead of running off to the city. But whatever else you do, if pos- sible try to work this question out for yourself without going to the ten- ant system. A tenant never keeps up a place as well as its owner. And at that I can hardly blame them, for they don’t know how long they will stay and they can never feel the real pride that a farm owner does. Back of it all, of course, is the question of the farmer making enough money. If the farmer got the full value of what he produced he would have enough to make life comfortable on the farm all the time and the city papers would not have to be preaching the “back to the farm” movement. Some people think farmers are nat- urally penurious. This is not so. If you see, now and then, an old farmer who deserves to be called “tight-fisted” you can be sure that he was forced to learn the lesson of rigid economy during his earlier years, and simply finds it impossible to break the habits of a lifetime. ; With the Nonpartisan league -program giving farmers a fairer share of what they produce, each farmer should be able to make his home life on the farm as perfect as anything he can get in the small town. : ’ It is mod- CITY AND COUNTRY ; 5 It will be a blessed thing if out of this trial and the occupational and economic readjustment to which we must resort we can establish a new re- lation or revive an old relation between the town woman and the country woman; if we can make farm home life more comfortable; if we ecan make city home life more wholesome; if we can take into the country something more of the city’s spirit of aspiration; if we can get into the city something more of the country’s spirit of humility; if we can take to the country the order and progress of the city and if we can take to the city the freshness and the fragrance of the country. Such an under- taking of blessing and beauty will yield a richer accomplishment under the acknowledged instinct of women than under the boasted philosophy of men.— CLARENCE F. OUSLEY, assistant secretary of agriculture, in an address before the woman’s com- mittee, Council of National Defense. - 3 [ ] o0 h.:;»g.'xvi"{:r,h"rt~‘-' ‘M 8 L s 3 { - < o, - | L 4 T S R e R,