THE FARMER’S CHANGED CONDITION

by Rodney Welch, The Forum vol. 10 (February 1891), pp. 689-700

[p.689] DURING my childhood, which was passed on a rocky hillside farm in New England, farmers constituted a class more nearly independent than any other in the community. They were engaged in domestic husbandry, which embraced the care of cultivated fields, pastures, gardens, orchards, and forests. They produced nearly all the food that was necessary for their families. The owner of a small farm not infrequently raised corn, wheat, rye, barley, and buckwheat, as well as potatoes and all kinds of garden vegetables. The sweets for the table were often limited to the sugar and molasses that he made from the sap of the maple, and to the honey collected by his bees. Small game was obtained from the forest, and trout were caught in the streams that flowed among the hills. The lakes afforded larger fish, like perch and pickerel. Every farmer’s intention was to raise each needful article of food that the climate and soil enabled him to produce. Even condiments, like pepper, caraway seed, sage, and other sweet herbs, were not below his attention. As a considerable portion of every farm was covered with forest trees of various kinds, the owner was at no expense for fuel or for materials to be used in making fences or in erecting ordinary buildings.

In those times most of the trade of farmers was carried on by barter. Eggs, butter, cheese, and smoked hams were taken by country store-keepers in exchange for groceries, dry goods, and notions. Nearly every farmer went to the seashore once a year, and exchanged apples, cider, potatoes, and garden vegetables for fish. The products of farm, garden, and orchard often paid the salary of the minister, the fees of the doctor, and the subscription price of the newspaper. A thrifty farmer generally managed to have the skins of the animals that he slaughtered at home tanned and dressed on shares, as by so doing he obtained leather for making shoes and boots for his family, without the payment [p.690] Shoe-makers then went from house to house, taking a kit of tools with them and often remaining for several days at a time. In many cases they made their shoe pegs from blocks of birch wood that the farmer had in readiness, used thread that the farmer’s wife had spun from flax grown on the farm, and smoothed it with wax saved from the honey comb that had been taken from the bee hive. They were often paid for their services in cord wood, hay, grain, potatoes, butter, cheese, stocking yarn, or other articles that were useful in a family. Tailoresses also went from house to house and cut and made the garments worn by the men and boys. Wheelwrights held themselves in readiness to go to farmers’ homes and make the running gear of the ox carts that were then generally employed to draw heavy articles on the farm and to haul them to market. Pump-makers, too, plied their art on farms at the call of the owners.

Every farm house was then a manufactory, not of one kind of goods, but of many. All day long in the chamber or attic the sound of the spinning wheel and loom could be heard. Carpets, shawls, bed spreads, table covers, towels, and cloth for garments were made from materials produced on the farm. Many of these kinds of cloth were marvels of beauty and utility. The kitchen of the house was a baker’s shop, a confectioner’s establishment, and a chemist’s laboratory. Every kind of food for immediate use was prepared there daily; and on special occasions sausages, head cheese, pickles, apple butter, and preserves were made. It was also the place where soap, candles, and vinegar were manufactured. In one of the buildings attached to the house, or near it, the farmer had a workshop in which he made ox yokes, bows for fastening cattle to stanchions, milking stools, the handles for farming tools, and often the tools themselves. Agricultural implements were then few and simple, and farmers made as many of them as they could. There were no commercial dairy establishments then, but every farm house was a creamery and a cheese factory. The apparatus for making butter and cheese was crude, but the skillful housewife understood how to use it so as to turn out good articles. As there were no sewing machines, the farmer’s wife and daughters had to ply the hand needle most of the time when they were not engaged in [p.691] more laborious pursuits. During the long evenings they generally knit socks and mittens or made rag carpets.

As has been stated, little money circulated among farmers. In fact, but little was required, except to purchase school books and other articles that could not be obtained by barter, and to pay taxes and postage. Some of the taxes, even, were not paid in money. The highway tax was generally paid in labor, or rather in play. Each farmer was assessed according to the property he owned in the district, and the amount was represented in characters expressing dollars and cents. But he was allowed by the highway surveyor a certain amount for each day during which he, or his son, hired man, or ox team, was employed in repairing the roads. The time thus spent was generally one of quiet enjoyment, and was largely occupied in telling stories and relating gossip. To raise money to pay the State and county taxes, it was generally necessary to sell a fat steer to a person who was making up a drove of cattle to take to the Boston market. In many cases farmers had their postage charged up to them till they could raise money to pay it.

At the time of which I write, no labor-saving machines were used on farms, and all the implements were of the most primitive kind. Indian corn was dropped by hand and cultivated with a hoe. The stalks were cut with a knife, the husks were removed with the fingers, and the kernels were taken from the cob by drawing it across the edge of a shovel blade. All the food grains were harvested with a sickle and threshed with a hand flail, generally on a barn floor. Securing the hay crop was the most tiresome of all operations on the farm, as the grass was cut with a hand scythe, spread out to dry with a hand fork, collected with a hand rake, and then lifted upon a cart, from which it was again lifted to a mow or scaffold. Flax, of which nearly every farmer raised a little, was pulled by hand, spread out by hand to insure the rotting of the woody fiber, and dressed by hand. Inventive ingenuity had then accomplished much in contriving machines to lessen the toil of men who worked in shops and in factories; but it had done next to nothing toward relieving the labor, or lightening the burdens, of the men who labored in the field. Wheat was gathered as in the time of Ruth and Boaz, and the [p.692] grain was beaten out and winnowed as by Roman slaves in the days of Nero. Most of the pastoral scenes described by the writers of the Old Testament, and by Virgil and Agricola, were presented anew every year in New England during the period under consideration. The inventor had not dreamed of machines for planting, cultivating, and harvesting field crops.

There was little of what could be called commercial farming in the northern States at that time. Farmers who were located near the seacoast, or near a navigable river, could always dispose of their surplus products to good advantage and at fair prices. But such was not the case with farmers who lived a long distance from water communications. They could drive their cattle to market, but the price of their grain was consumed in hauling it a hundred miles, while their apples and potatoes would not be accepted as gifts. There was often great scarcity of some product of which there was an abundance in a locality two hundred miles away. Wool was almost the only article that could be transported a long distance without having its price absorbed in the cost of cartage. There were no railroads. The earth roads were poor, and oxen were generally employed to draw farm products to market. At that time toll was exacted for crossing a bridge over any considerable stream. Farmers derived little enjoyment from amusements or recreations during this period; in fact, they had little time to engage in them. Even the few pastimes that were tolerated were combinations of labor with sport, such as corn-huskings, apple-parings, and house-raisings. The women then derived as much enjoyment, perhaps, from a quilting party as those of our day do from a meeting of a Browning club.

At present little remains to remind one of the condition of farmers during the time I have referred to. They now generally occupy the great prairies of the West instead of the hills and valleys of the eastern States. They are no longer engaged in domestic farming. Like manufacturers and the operators of mines, they are producing articles for supplying the market. They buy almost as many things as do persons who live in towns. They do not take their wheat and corn to a custom mill to be converted into flour and meal, but they sell their grain and buy [p.693] the materials to make bread for their families. They have given up raising small products for the supply of their tables, and as a consequence their grocery bills are large. As there are few trees in the prairie regions, and as the area occupied by forests in other parts of the country has been greatly reduced, farmers are compelled to purchase their fuel, which is generally bituminous coal, and to buy all the materials used in the construction of fences and buildings. The owners of many western farms are obliged to buy even pea sticks and bean poles.

The farmer of the present day has no necessity for bartering his products. He has no occasion to use eggs instead of coins when he is making small purchases. Everything he raises commands a price, though it may be small. In many of the western States—Illinois, for instance—nine tenths of the farm houses are within five miles of railway stations, and at most of these stations are grain elevators and yards for holding cattle and hogs till they can be loaded upon stock cars. There is no occasion for a farmer to go to a city market with his stock, grain, wool, or other products. He generally finds it to his advantage to consign them to some commission merchant, thus saving the cost of travel. Whatever he consigns to a stranger or to a stock-yard company will, in the majority of cases, be sold at the highest market price; and the money that he receives, less the freight and commissions, will be promptly remitted to him. In many places persons go about the country securing horses and dairy cows, for which cash is always paid. Still, the average farmer seldom has money in his purse for any great length of time. The sum he receives for his products is generally anticipated. He is ordinarily in debt to the grocer, the dry-goods merchant, and the dealer in agricultural implements. His place is mortgaged, and the interest due on his borrowed money must be paid annually. He often has to make sacrifices on live stock to obtain money to pay his taxes.

The farm house is no longer a rnanufactory: the sound of the loom and the spinning wheel is never heard in it, and the socks and mittens used by members of the family are not knit at home. If many cows are kept on the place, their milk is generally sent to a creamery or to a cheese factory. The making of candles, [p.694] soap, beer, and vinegar, the bleaching of cloth, straw hats, and bonnets, and the dyeing of garments, are numbered among the lost arts of the household. The introduction of machinery has revolutionized almost every branch of work on farms, and has greatly reduced the number of laborers required. In the great grain-producing sections of the country, farming has almost become a sedentary occupation. The soil is turned by a gang plow drawn by four horses, while the driver is mounted on a spring seat covered with a cushion. The sower no longer goes forth to scatter seed which he carries in a bag or basket; he rides on a grain drill and holds the reins that guide a pair of matched bay or chestnut horses, handsome enough to draw a duchess through the streets of London. At harvest time the owner of the wheat fields mounts another cushioned spring seat, shaded by a canopy, and again takes the reins; the self-binding harvester does the rest. Corn is planted, cultivated, husked, and shelled by machines. Haymaking, once the most laborious occupation on the farm, has been rendered the easiest by the introduction of machines that cut the grass, spread it over the surface of the ground, rake it together when it bas become dry, raise it upon the wagon, and carry it to the hay loft or stack. The flail has been laid aside with the distaff, the hand loom, and the spinning wheel. The steam-propelled threshing machine surpasses any other labor-saving device ever invented. It is not strange that some Arabs, who saw one devour a dozen grain stacks in a few minutes at a French exposition several years ago, ran from the place, leaped a high fence, prostrated themselves on the ground, turned their affrighted faces toward Mecca, and called on Allah to save them from destruction. These devout sons of the desert were believers in miracles, but they were not prepared for the kind of miracle they had witnessed. It was something more startling than a voice from heaven, than the raising of the dead, and than the visions of Mohammed, the father of the faithful. To their minds it was something opposed to the laws of nature as well as to the spirit of religion.

Still, with all these apparently beneficial changes, with machines to do nearly all the work, with money for their products instead of “store pay,” with a market at the door, with more [p.695] leisure and less drudgery, I doubt if farmers are any better contented with their lot, or if they obtain more enjoyment from life, than they did in old times. I also question if they are more prosperous. They are generally in a condition of unrest, if not of discontent. Their social condition has not improved, as has that of mechanics and traders. Most of them are anxious to leave the farm for the store, the shop, the mine, or the locomotive.

The reason for this state of things may be found in the suggestion that changes have been made so fast that farmers have not been able to adapt themselves to them. The farmer is naturally a conservative, but the inventor is a restless agitator. In colonial times, and during the first half of the existence of the nation, the ambition of nearly every man of fair means and education was to become a country gentleman. Many engaged in trade or in ocean transportation that they might acquire the money necessary to purchase, improve, and stock a farm. The love of broad acres, of forests, orchards, horses, cattle, sheep, and stately mansions surrounded by lawns and gardens, was brought by our ancestors from the mother country. It increased on being transplanted to a region where everyone could easily acquire land. For more than a century rural life was in almost every respect preferable to urban life; it afforded greater facilities for enjoyment and for physical and intellectual development.

The society of the country was then as refined and cultured as that of the towns. Some of the most distinguished divines preached to congregations composed almost entirely of farmers and their families. Physicians of great repute and ripe scholarship lived in farm houses and visited their rural patients on horseback, carrying their medicines and surgical instruments in saddle bags. Many farmers of large means then employed tutors to instruct their sons and daughters in their homes. The old catalogues of colleges and professional schools show that nearly all the students came from the rural districts. Most of them, on graduating, settled in the neighborhoods where they had spent their childhood and youth. Several of our early presidents were farmers, as were the governors of most of the States. More than one congressional directory shows that the majority of the senators and representatives were farmers; even Daniel Webster and [p.696] Henry Clay took pride in being classed among them. At that time the legislation for States, counties, and towns was the work of farmers. Then a large proportion of the trustees of all the colleges in the country were farmers, or professional men who reo sided in the country. In short, farmers constituted a class from which men could be selected who were, by virtue of their intellect and learning, competent to fill almost any public position. There was a dignity pertaining to their occupation. They were the owners of landed estates which they occupied and which they intended should be the inheritance of their children. There was as radical a difference between the agricultural class and the floating population of commercial and manufacturing towns as between real and personal property. The former were on their farms to stay, whatever might be the price of goods or the demand for labor. They were interested in all permanent public improvements. They were the pillars that supported the State, for on them rested the burden of taxation.

Before the introduction of railways, the wagon roads of the country were used much more than they are now, being employed not only for the transportation of farm products and manufactured articles, but for general travel. Stages then carried passengers and mails from one large town to another, but most persons who traveled for pleasure rode in their own carriages. As so many travelers passed farms that were located on the public highways, the owners took pride in keeping their land in an attractive condition. They were proud of the appearance of their buildings and of the grounds about them, Farm houses then suggested comfort, refinement, and hospitality.

Roman writers inform us that, at one time in the history of their country, cities became so attractive that farmers of wealth and culture left their estates in the care of others and took up their residences in the places that afforded greater facilities for pleasure. This migration had a most injurious effect on the rural population that remained. The persons who had been leaders in culture and refinement no longer exerted an influence over their former neighbors. They were residents of a city, and they were supported on the money that they drew from the country. The difference between the urban population of Italy and [p.697] its rural population soon became marked. There was one civilization for the towns and another for the country, as was shown by the difference in dress, language, and manner of living. Every boy in the streets of Rome could recognize a countryman at a glance; while a resident of the city was distinguishable by his elegant manners, as well as by his clothing and language, when he visited the country for purposes of business or pleasure. This interesting history was repeated in France just before the revolution. With little doubt, it was the cause of that event. Cities had grown in wealth and power at the expense of the country. The taxes collected from farmers were used for the benefit of those who lived in the towns. For a long time the rural population submitted to constantly-increasing oppressions, but a day came when they rebelled, and in a week they righted the wrongs of many decades.

The migration from country to town commenced in our northern States near the close of the civil war, and it has been steadily increasing till the present time. It has included the most desirable and the least desirable of the inhabitants of the rural districts. It may sound strange to eastern readers, but it is nevertheless true, that in the States of Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa more farms have been deserted by their owners than in New Hampshire, Vermont, and Massachusetts. In the New England States owners leave their farms because the labor spent in cultivating them is no longer remunerative, but such is not the case in the prairie regions of the West. There the owners of farms leave them for the reason that they can obtain sufficient rent from tenants to enable them to support their families in towns. Cities in several of the western States contain hundreds of retired farmers. Springfield, Ill., and Janesville, Wis., are good examples of the towns in which these absentee landlords reside. They obtained land at a low price, and improved it with the intention of residing permanently upon it; but when they became independent they divided their farms into small tracts, erected cheap buildings on them, and leased them, generally to persons of foreign birth.

These retired farmers, or absentee landlords, take little interest in maintaining good roads in the townships in which their [p.698] land is situated, or in sustaining schools of a high grade. As a rule they do not even keep up the improvements on their farms or commence new ones. They erect no substantial buildings, plant no orchards and vineyards, and set out no ornamental trees and shrubs. Their farms are worked, as mines and quarries are, for the amount of marketable material they can be made to produce. As their tenants ordinarily lease the land from year to year, they have no interest in making improvements. Occasionally a stately residence, surrounded by lawns and pleasure grounds and affording evidence that it has been recently erected, is still seen in the country; but it is not often the home of a grain-producer or of a general farmer. It is more likely to belong to a breeder of fine stock, to some wealthy man who moved out of the city for the improvement of his health, to a person who is raising fruit or stock as a pastime, or to one of that much-ridiculed, greatly-abused, but very useful class known as “fancy farmers.” The successful farmer now defers erecting a house of such a character till he has moved to the town.

Wealthy farmers move to town because they wish better social, educational, and religious advantages than are afforded in the country. The desire for amusements also exerts an influence. When one family of refinement and culture leaves a farming neighborhood, several are likely to follow its example, till finally the desire for agreeable companionship causes nearly every farmer of intelligence and refinement to leave the place which he had fitted up for a home. The result of this is the formation of a distinct peasant class, such as is found in Bavaria and Bohemia. In entire counties in Illinois and Wisconsin the English language is scarcely ever heard outside of the large towns. The church services are conducted in a foreign tongue, and instruction is given in it in the schools. The intellectual condition of the people who occupy farms there is not above that of the lowest class of laborers in our large cities. The townships they inhabit seem like detached portions of central Europe put down near the center of the new world. Nominally these men may be citizens, for town politicians have had them passed through the naturalization mill; but they know little and care less about the institutions of the country.

[p.699] Farmers have long been losing their place and influence in the councils of the State and nation. Our later Congresses have not contained enough farmers from the northern States to constitute the committees on agriculture. Our national law-makers have known so little about what would promote the prosperity of farmers that they have favored measures that have greatly injured agriculture. They have insisted on developing the national domain in advance of a demand for any more land for cultivation, and they have purchased Indian reservations of great size and have disposed of the land at a price that has scarcely paid the cost of surveying and the expenses of the land offices. By these means they have encouraged tens of thousands of persons to engage in farming who would otherwise have remained in other pursuits. The offer of free land, or of land at a nominal price, has tempted many to leave shops, mines, and vessels, and to engage in agriculture. These have become the competitors of the producers in the old States who had spent much time and money in improving farms. They have overstocked the home and foreign markets with grain, meat, vegetables, fruits, dairy products, and honey, and as a consequence the price of nearly every farm product has declined, sometimes below the cost of the labor required to produce it.

The rural districts have not shared with towns the recent great improvements in the postal service. In large towns, letters and papers are collected and delivered several times each day without cost to those using the mails. There are sub-postal stations as well as a general post office. At each of these, postal notes and money orders are made out and cashed. But in the country the postal facilities are hardly any better than they were a century ago. There are no money-order post offices, except in large commercial and manufacturing towns, and no free collection and distribution of mail matter. If a farmer wishes to mail a letter he must go to the post office, perhaps ten miles away, to do it. If his commission merchant writes him to forward his cattle or grain quickly, as the price is high, the chances are that he will not receive the letter till the market has fallen.

No good reason can be assigned why money orders should not be issued and cashed at every post office in the country. As [p.670] to the free collection and free delivery of postal matter, the people in the rural districts are as much entitled to them as town people are, although the service could not from the nature of things be performed so often in a sparsely-settled region as in a thickly-populated one. The general intelligence of any class largely depends on its facilities for learning what is going on in the world. Favoring one class gives it a special advantage, which in time will produce marked results. Depriving country people of the postal facilities that are enjoyed by those who live in large towns, tends to lower their intellectual standing and to keep it below that of those who live in cities. In nearly all European countries the postal facilities are as good in the rural districts as in the large towns. In several of those countries country people have the advantage of the parcel post and of postal saving banks. They are not slighted because they cultivate farms and vineyards, or raise cattle, sheep, and fowls.

It is plainly the duty of our government to preserve the constantly- diminishing class once known and honored as country gentlemen. They were the fathers of the Republic, and for a long time constituted our true nobility. The little remnant should be preserved and, if possible, increased. The founders of our government never intended to foster absentee landlords and to create an ignorant rural peasantry.

RODNEY WELCH