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Show SMALL TOWN IS NECESSARY Two things have come out of the depression that are worth noting. The large centers of population have discovered that they cannot get along without the country. The small communities have discovered that they can make their own life without much worrying concerning large cities. For long it was a habit of big-cities big-cities to display airs of superiority to the so-called "rural communities." com-munities." They have pretended to believe that the small town was passing into eclipse, and that people would flock to big cities and make them more and more important and influential. And, also, a lot of "country" people, lured by the glamor of the cities, have left the countryside. They have discovered, many of them too late, that life in the small communities has a thousand advantages ad-vantages not possessed by large centers, and that the mushroom development of big cities has been a bad, not too good thing. Today To-day the small city is taking on a new dignity and individuality. We see everywhere the proof that the small community is realizing realiz-ing its possibilities, forgetting to ape the manners of the more artificial ar-tificial "centers of population," and attending enthusiastically to the duty of building a destiny for itself. As the small community becomes strengthened, and as the farm community becomes more independent, the large city will prosper too. What we need in America is vitality of individual effort, and this is what the small city will give in the next generation as it did in the past. The disillusioned folk who thought that the bright lights were what nuvde life worth while, will be drifting back to the country, eager to capture once again the peace, the sincerity, the integrity, the gladness that abides where neighborly comradeship is possible. |