Salt Lake Tribune | 1917-12-30 | Page 42 | Auto's Status as Necessity Proved

AUTO'S STATUS AS NECESSITY PROVED Studebaker Official Delves Deep Into Subject; Great Utility Shown. "Supposing." says ' George 1. Willnian, assistant sales manager and advertising manager of the Studebaker corporation, "we should wake up some fine morning and find that overnight some learned savant had decided that the automobile was a luxury and an unnecessary plaything", play-thing", a toy for an overgrown boy, and that some fourteen hundred thousand farmers living in the east, west and south-central states of this country of ours were told that they would have to give up their automobiles very soon because be-cause somebody decided that they were unnecessary and that no more were to he made after the present supply had run out. "Supposing that a ukase was served on some four hundred thousand business men in this country that automobiles were unnecessary, and that they had better bet-ter set ready to buy horses again as soon as the present supply of automobiles ran out. Supposing that our learned savant had decided that automobiles were not necessary to our armies, or to the Red Cross, or to anyone interested in the transportation of the vital needs of war. It seems ridiculous, d-oesn't it? It is hardly less ridiculous than the amount of talk we hear and writing we read in ref-, erenee to whether or not the automobile is a necessity. "The Dominion of Canada alone collects 54,oyo,0ui) a year in duties on the automobile auto-mobile sent into Canada to supply the needs of Canadians; and our conservative cousins to the north are not giving $5,000,000 to their government just to bring In toys. The province of Alberta has 20.000 automobiles. An unprejudiced investigation in Canada shows that 74 per cent of the automobiles owned in Manitoba. Mani-toba. Saskatchewan and Alberta are owned by farmers. "After this country has beea in war for three years, the chances are that our reat north-central and sou th -central-states will need more automobiles than ever, but even if we do not supplv another an-other farmer with an automobile, it will require half a million automobiles alone to replace the ears now m use in onlv twelve great north-central farmuig slates "It would of course he absurd t$ say that every automobile is an absolute necessity ne-cessity to the man who owns it. It would be just as ridiculous to sav that every horse and carriage was an" absolute abso-lute necessity to the man who owns it Lodoy or the man who owned It ten years ago. but we do not condemn the horse as unnecessary and a luxurv because a new 'sports' had fine horses for pleasure , purposes. ( "I do not think we have to worrv about the mail who is going to buv the automobile automo-bile because it's a luxurv. Ye are pretty safe in assuming that even if his patriotism patri-otism does not prevent the increased cost of living in these war times, it -will prevent pre-vent his extravagance without the neces-sltv neces-sltv of special legislation. "Iet us worry ourselves f-r more about how we are going to, find .lOO.ooo cars a year to take care of the farmers who reallv need them in twelve great farming states In this country; and while we are worrying-, let us worry about the automobile automo-bile needs of some thirty-five or forty states, nt including these twelve great farming states. Let us worrv about the CHntulian farmer, who will need his automobile auto-mobile next year just as he found It nec-ess.nry nec-ess.nry this year. "The great problem before us todav is not one of deciding whether the autorno-mle autorno-mle is necessary or unnecessary, but how we are going to find enough of them to take care of the needs, as absolute necessities neces-sities to millions of people, and most of them who need them to increase their e f f i c i e n cy a n d prod u c t i v i t v. '