Show LEARNED HIS hl E 1 LESS LESSON ON I 1 hans garbus Is in a farmer ire in 1 a german farmer in tho the state of iowa anc being irana hans garbus and a german and a firmer ho he has learned some interesting things there are many german germans thero there are many farmers not only in iowa but in other states but thero there arc are not enough like this man garbus who have learned things from their experience this farmer hans garbus wrote a letter ietter to the tile farm journal published in philadelphia in which ho lie summarized his experience also 1 that of hia his neighbors and in which ho he told somo sone interesting things that ho he had I 1 learned during tho the last thirty years or more that he has been following the business of farming in the state of 0 iowa his ills letter la is indeed a human document it Is so human that it should bo reproduced by every local newspaper paper throughout the country that other farmers who aro are following the practice of living in ond onri community and lending their business support to another might read of the fate that befell liana hans garbus and some of his neighbors who did likewise for so many vears cars mr mrs garbus writes as follows we fai fan banners mers ners are awakening to the fact that wy ue have unmistakably come to the period where N we e must think ard plan I 1 am one of tha the slow 1 german farmers that had to be shown and I 1 am now giving my ex experience perance that 0 others may profit for knowledge Is more expensive now than two years year 8 a ago go tenta cinc years ago I 1 began my farm career I 1 had an old team and 50 our furniture was nas mostly handmade chairs cupboard and lounge madre from dry ire goods boxes neatly covered with nith ten cent cretonne by my girl wife ife we rented eighty acrea being a boy of good habits I 1 got all needed machinery and groceries of our home merchants on credit until fall crops were sold the first vear lear was a wet vet se m n and I 1 did not make enough to pay creditors I 1 went N ent to each on date of promise and explained conditions paying as much as pos elble 11 and they all carried the balance over oer another year they continued to accommodate me until I 1 was able to buy a forty acre piece of my own As soon as I 1 ow on ned these few acres the mall mail order houses began sending me cital ital and gradually I 1 began sending my loose change to the them 11 letting my accounts stand in my home town ton where I 1 had gotten my accommodation mo dation when I 1 needed it IL we then had one of the thriftiest little villages in the state good line of business in all the branches merchants who nho were vere willing to help an honest fellow over a bad year and a town full of 0 people gnp came twice a week to trade and visit isil our little country town supported a library high school band ball team and ue e had bad big celebrations every ear car A farm n near par a live me town soon doubles in value I 1 sold my forty acres at a big advance and bought an eighty gradually adding to it until I 1 had tv two hundred acres of the best land in in iowa loa I 1 then felt no need of ashing asking favors and found it easy to patronize patroni c the mall mail order agents that c came q me a almost I 1 weekly to our door I 1 regret to say that I 1 was the first in the county to make up a neighborhood bill and send vend it to a mall order house though we rot bit every cery once in a while we got in the habit of sending away for stuff gradually our merchants lessened their stocks of goods tor for lack of patronage finally we began to realize that when we needed a bolt quickly for machinery or soothing elo thing for sickness or death we e had to send away for it which pleasant one by one our merchants moved to places where here they were appreciated and men of less energy moed in crudu dually duany our jovn town has gone down our business houses are tacky in appear ance tt number are empty our schools churches and walks are going down wo we have no band no library nor ball ball team there thero Is no business done in tho the town and therefore no taxes s to keep keel things up hotel la to closed for lack of travel go down to tho the depot when the freight pull pulls in and you see bee the sequel la in mall mail order packages ages nino nine 5 cars ago agu my farm was worth 9 an aero acre today id rd havo have a hard matter to sell it at 67 an acre it it Is too far aiom a live town 0 every farmer has said that wants to buy ho he wants ants a pl place ce near schools and churches where his children can have advantages 1 I have awakened to the tile fact that in helping to pull th the 0 t town a wn ilon doun it haa hag cost mo me in nine years like tho the majority of farmers I 1 figure far enough ahead I 1 sort of business moans means the doing away with country towns what will it mean to farmers to have only a few large cities at a distance of five hundred or a thousand miles what arc are wo we going to do d with our children who we demanding even better ad wi ligos than we had cities we help to build return no fabors they take our money but bul offer no credit in time of need it 1 0 o I high schools etc ve mutt the money and build near our farm homes or send bend our bos and girls to tho the cities at great expense amidst temptations 0 WHICH the tho farm hai hag no equal neither am I 1 t the 0 only awakening farmer these mall mail order agents that come to our homes evry ev ry week are becoming a nuisance and making it unsafe to leave women and c children fill dren clone mono on tho the farm with farm cordiality wo we take these strangers into our homes often as one of the family and we are sometimes paid in having them entice our girls to the city these are some facts that need consideration and I 1 havo have decided that the safest proposition all around Is for the country people to look af after ter their own interests and build up their own country towns that bring value alue to their farms let those who N want ant to patronize the cita mail order house go t there here to live getting their living where they give ghe their patronage the remainder of my life will be given to building up the home town that I 1 have helped to pull down brother farmers you can cantale take my advice or get your knowledge the way I 1 got mine HANS GARBUS GARDUS every community has men like hans garbus like garbus many of them are farmers but not all of them thern many many towns have merchants who are as foolish as hans garbus the farmer these merchants will send away for goods carried by their competitors under the foolish belief that they are saving money these men have many times helped to kill their own town sometimes real estate men do these things and help drive down the price of their own property and sometimes other property owners do them newspapers suffer as much from the mail order houses as the merchants but most of them like the news keep right on boosting the town bj by showing how liow the mail order houses wi will ill kill the country towns maybe the editors are foolish tor lor doing this but most of them have civic pride enough to make them forget how some so me of the merchants tr treat at abb t home paper |