Nearly every town and city of the United States has had a so-called Commercial Club. This has been in reality a boosters’ club bent first of all on bringing big business to the place and thus opening the way for a bigger population. Anything for the sake of more people has been the watchword. Now, I would reverse this order of things. Nearly every one of these towns and cities needs a club or committee that might have for its purposes: (1) to show the would-be retired farmer how to shift the burdens from his wife as housekeeper, how to provide better social and intellectual advantages for his children and yet stay on the farm; (2) to find means and methods whereby to plant in the rural community those persons of the city population who are not making a fair living in their present positions, seeking first of course to choose those who are capable of transplanting and then preparing them with care for the change.
I am satisfied that this thing can be successfully thought out,—that is, how the worthy poor city family may be removed to the country and there through hard work gradually acquire enough land whereon to earn a fair living at least. This end will never be accomplished by merely driving out the poor families, but rather by means of scientific and sympathetic practice of re-establishing them. Well-conducted research shows that these poor people are nearly all constituted of good, sound, human stock. So, if transported under the conditions named, there may be expected to come forth in the second generation a splendid crop of rural boys and girls.
REFERENCES
Report of the Commission on Country Life. Introduction by Theodore Roosevelt. Sturgis-Walton Company, New York. A brief but epoch-making book. The student of rural problems will find it a splendid outline guide.
Cutting Loose from the City. E. G. Hutchins. Country Life, Jan. 1, 1911.
Back to the Farm. J. Smith. Collier’s, Feb. 25, 1911.
Value of a Country Education to Every Boy. Craftsman, January, 1911.
Why Back to the Farm? Editorial. Craftsman, February, 1911.
The Country-Life Movement. L. H. Bailey. The Macmillan Co. Contains a contrast of the back-to-the-land movement and the country-life movement.
Drift to the City in Relation to the Rural Problem. J. M. Gillette. American Journal of Sociology, March, 1911.
The New Country Boy. Independent, June 22, 1911.
Overworked Children on the Farm and in the School. Dr. Woods Hutchinson. Annals American Academy, March, 1909.
Why One Hundred Boys ran away from Home. L. E. Jones. Ladies’ Home Journal, April, 1910.
The Country Girl who is coming to the City. Batchelor. Delineator, May, 1909.
Play and Playground Literature. For most helpful and inexpensive literature on this subject address: The Playground Association of America, 1 Madison Ave., New York City.
Conservation in the Rural Districts. James W. Robertson, D.Sc. The Association Press, New York.
Education for Country life. Willet M. Hays. Free Bulletin, U.S. Department of Agriculture. Treats ably consolidation and rural agricultural high schools.
Child Problems. George B. Mangold. Ph.D. Book II, Chapters I-II, “Play and the Playground”; Book III, Chapters I-V, “Child Labor Problems.” The last reference contains accurate information as to child-labor legislation up to date of publication.
Influence of Heredity and Environment upon Race Improvements. Kelsey. Annals American Academy, July, 1909.
Burning up the Boys. Editorial. North American, September, 1910.
CHAPTER IV
THE COUNTRY MOTHER AND THE CHILDREN
Greater attention needs to be given to the conservation of the farmer’s wife. Although there are many other justifications for giving more thought to the care and the comfort of the country mother, the single fact of her very close relation to the children growing up in the home, and of her peculiar responsibilities as center of life there, warrant us in devoting a chapter to her interests. Recently, while passing upon a country highway, the author met a funeral procession. A little inquiry revealed a pathetic situation, one that has been repeated thousands of times throughout the length and breadth of this fair country. The deceased was the wife of a young farmer, both of them under thirty-five years of age, hard working and ambitious for success, but thoughtless of their own health and comfort. Their farm was somewhat new and unimproved, there were hundreds of things to do other than the routine affairs of home keeping and crop raising. Worst of all, there was a mortgage to be lifted. After all reasonable improvements were made and the mortgage paid off, then, according to their plans, they were going to take matters easy. But the delicate cord of life suddenly broke in the case of the wife, and left the young husband as overseer of the farm and home and sole caretaker of three little children.
How can parents hope to produce a better crop of boys and girls in the farm communities so long as the typical farm wife is crushed into the earth with the over-weight of the burdens placed upon her? A few minutes’ enumeration in this same rural neighborhood brought out the startling fact that in fully half of the homes a scene similar to the one just described had been enacted during the last score of years. That is to say, during the twenty years, fully one-half of the farm mothers living in that particular neighborhood had died before their time from one cause or another. In most instances the death occurred during what we usually speak of as the prime years of life, and at a time when the rose bloom should naturally be fresh upon the cheek. Fortunately, this serious condition, still present in some communities, is being gradually improved by the improved methods.