The progressive farmer and southern farm gazette., June 11, 1910, Image 1

About The progressive farmer and southern farm gazette. (Starkville, Miss.) 1910-1920

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p§C_firA Farm and Home Weekly for the States of Mississippi,
Alabama, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee.
POUNDED. 1895. BY DR. TAIT BUTLER. AT STARKVILLE, MISS.
Volume XV. No. 23. SATURDAY, JUNE II, 1910. Weekly: $1 a Year.
2,000,000 White People in Mississippi by 1920!
arc glad to ace that Governor Noel has called a State
wide Immigration Convention to be held in Jackson, Miss.,
June 21st and 22nd. If only emphasis be laid on getting the
right kind of immigration, such a convention may prove of the
very highest importance to the State.
The South is still too sparsely settled. Our eleven South
ern States, excluding Texas, support only 16,000,000people of
b-yth races, and only 10,000,000 white people, while the same
area in Europe supports over 160,000,000 white people. And
it must be remembered that up to a certain point which we
shall not reach for centurtes yet, and other things being equal,
prosperity depends unon den- -
If the census of 1920 could show 3,000,000 white people
in Mississippi—or even 2,000,000 —the future of the State
would be assured. We should certainly aim at 2,000,000, and
the State-wide Immigration Convention should have the hearty
backing of every patriotic Mississippian in this endeavor.
If there were no other reason for favoring such immigra
tion from the West and North, we should favor it because
we need it to balance up our excessively large negro
population in every Southern State. We have only good will
/or the negro, bat his own interests as well as the white man’s
demand that population be equalized until the proportion of
- ___ aa a _ _ Ja. _ _ O_if._ Oi . i .
sity of population. If you
owned the continent of North'
America but lived on it
alone, or if a hundred or a
thousand men owned the con
tinent and lived on it alone,
it would be worth practically
nothing to them. Population
makes wealth, provided only
that it is normally intelligent
und efficient.
The Farmers' Union has
done well to warn our people
against indiscriminate Euro
pean immigration. If such im
• .4 • * *
— riv ui/uincrfl UIUIV |
sfta// exceed 20 per cent The
burden of the negro’s ignor
ance and backwardness is such
that he himself cannot advance
properly in a community where
he outnumbers the white man.
In the last census year Missis
sippi showed the smallest pro
portion of white population
(41 per cent) of all the States
in the Union—only 600,000
white people in our borders
when there should be 3,000,
000. Its great plantations cut
up into 100-acre farms, and
migration came cniejiy jrom
England, Scotland, Ireland,
Germany and Holland, as it
once did, it would he different,
and such immigration would
help us now, but the trouble is L
HAY-MAKING TIME.
If you expect your live stock to thrive next winter, you should provide a good supply of hay
I’ennsnent meadows are all too few in the South, and this makes it necessary for ua to depend
r hi** fly on such crops as the cowpea and the soy bean. The season for planting these crops
will soon bs over. too. Indeed, you haven’t an hour to lose if you would have plenty of legume
hay nest winter: and you can't afford to try to get along without it.
tne state made a great demo
cracy of thrifty and intelligent
small farmers owning their
own homes, it would become
one of the best agricultural
States in America.
that moat European immigration is now from Southern and
Eastern Europe, and is of an undesirable character. Because
it is of a low standard of intelligence and efficiency it is ob
jectionable, and on the very same principle immigration of a
normal or high standard of intelligence and efficiency is de
sirable.
Such immigration can be had and ought to be had, in some
measure perhajts from our English, Scotch, Dutch and Irish
kinsfolk across the sea, but chiefly from our Northern and
Western States. Eor years now hundreds of thousands of the
most enterprising and progressive farmers in the Middle West
have been going into Canada with its tong hard winters and
hitter climate, not only giving up American citizenship, but
actually paying two to three times as much for land in that
inhospitable n gion as land of the same fertility commands in
the South. We ought to have brought these men to the South,
t hey know our institutions, our language, they are industrious,
thrifty, wide-awake, and many of them are of Southern ances
try who should naturally come back home.
FEATURES OF THIS ISSUE.
OUR OVER-PRODUCTION OF MERCHANTS.—Twice as many
young Southerners go into mercantile business as are needed. They
should be in farming or manufacturing. See “What I Saw in the
Middle West,” page 421.
OUR OVER-SUPPLY OF SERVANTS.—See same article. Dr. G.
T. Winston says the South each generation wastes enough in unneces
sary servants to buy all the land.
ARE YOU CULTIVATING CORN AND COTTON RIGHT?—Most
farmers are not. See Mr. French’s article on page 415, and see If you
cannot improve your methods.
PUT YOUR STUBBLE LAND IN PEAS.—No acre of stubble land
should be left idle. See page 417.
MAKE A FIRELESS COOKER FOR YOUR WIFE.—You owe it
to her tills hot weather. Read directions on page 419.
HOW TO TAKE CARE OF THE BABY.—Authorities say 500
babies a day die in the United States unnecessarily as a result of
ignorance or carelessness. Mrs. Stevens’ articles last week and this
should save many an infant life.
THE MISSISSIPPI LIVE STOCK SANITARY BOARD.—Dr. But
ler’s address on this important subject to the State Live Stock and
Dairy Association.