Show MISS DAINES MEETS THE VAN F editors kotc this is fourth in a series of articles by miss bliss josephine paines daines telling of her ber experiences in studying farm life in the netherlands out to the farm our holiday was over and tile next step in holland was going to our farms arrangements had been made for evelyn haberman and I 1 to A be on farms of bi others brothers about 15 miles apart in the northeastern m most ost of the 11 provinces called Gro oscar was to be on a fruit farm in the neighboring province of drenthe we were taken to our farms by bar fl bolster the agriculture from our embassy and mr Schel kerman of the ahe folk high school who w was as 9 m charge of our program in that country we soon learned that we call the country holland there are eleven provinces in the country one of these is north holland and another south holland they with the other nine provinces make up the c country called netherlands these two holland provinces were the best known in earlier days and we americans have come to call the whole country by that name people in other parts of the country will ill often correct you if you say holland in referring to the whole country though many have come to make that use of it themselves we arrived in the north of the country and at the town of pieter picter bifi late in the afternoon some of the children playing in the street showed us the road which led to the van hoorn farm we followed this road for about a mile when it ended behind a large barn evidently this was the place though there was no house in sight sir air went around to the house and brought mr air and mrs airs van hoorn out to meet us they were a young couple of about thirty two little blond dutch boys followed them we all went into the house for a few minutes and then sir mr bolster mr air evelyn and oscar left roe me alone with the people who were to be my family for the coming weeks both mr air and mrs airs van boom had studied english in school and so could speak it but to a very limited extent before the first evening was over we made frequent use of a dictionary the little boys were pieter boewe 5 and martinus 3 they also had a baby girl named jannette six months old mr air van hoorn had a farm of acres he raised numerous crops including wheat summer ind winter barley oats pea seed rape seed for oils flax potatoes sugar beets for seed sugar and for the horses red clover and pas iture for the animals ile he employed five regular laborers and extra hands during the busy season ile he had 15 head of cattle 4 horses and 5 sheep his farm was quite mechanized as he be had bad a tractor cleve cieve trac binder combine in connection with another farmer flax puller mowing machine plows disc drill as well as other equipment the barn there was large as nany many of the crops have to be taken inside to be completely dried before harvesting can be completed the climate is damp and farming methods must always consider this fact mr air van hoorn leased eased his farm as do 49 per cent of the farmers in the netherlands ile he managed it and worked with his laborers most of the time the household lacked the mechanization aniza tion that the farm had cooking was done on a small stove that burned peat we had an old hoover vacuum cleaner and an electric iron which practically ended our list of electrical conveniences in their place we had a h ired hired girl as labor is very cheap the dutch ladies spend a lot of time cleaning but very little time in food preparation pa ration sly my work vork with the van hoorens was always in the house so go I 1 learned quite well how the house work went and can enlarge on it later incidentally on large farms it i nt considered proper for the ladies to work out in the fields |