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Show Released by Western Newspaper Union. FARMER FACES BETTER FUTURE THAN IN 1918 THE FARMERS of the nation will not be caught with the close ol this war as they were at the close ol World War I. In. 1917 and '18 they had gone land mad caused by a price of $2.50 for wheat, with other products in proportion. Many millions mil-lions of farmers had mortgaged the home acres to buy more land at impossible im-possible prices, and with money borrowed bor-rowed at high rates of interest. They had bet on a continuance of that $2.50 wheat price without considering consider-ing conditions. Because of a scarcity of shipping facilities, and because of the shorter water haul from North America this country and Canada were feeding Europe. The price of wheat under such conditions was of small moment, mo-ment, but the end of hostilities opened the European market to other oth-er wheat producing countries, and to increased production in Europe. Down came the price when the farmers were loaded with more than nine billion In farm mortgages. mort-gages. A price of one dollar, and even less, would not pay the interest charges. Foreclosures became the order of the times. The outstanding farm mortgages have been reduced to but little more than three billion now, and what is left has been refinanced on the basis of long time payments, and at much lower interest rates. During World War II the outstanding amount continues con-tinues to go down rather than up. The farmer will come through the war and face the future In better financial condition than many other lines of small business. They will not be fooled a second time. HOW LARGE CITIES DEPEND ON FARMERS WHEELER McMILLEN, editor o the Farm Journal and known in practically every farm home in America, in an address delivered before a New York City audience, said the farmers represent one-fourth one-fourth of our population; that the people dependent of the farms, those of the rural towns for each new dollar dol-lar they receive, represent another one-fourth. He might have gone farther far-ther and told those to whom he was talking that many of them, too, were dependent on the farms for the dol- -lars they receive. That would have included the agricultural product brokers, the food merchants, the stockholders and employees of trans- -j portation systems and others get ' much of their money through what the farm produces. Every one in every city is dependent on the farm for the food that sustains life. Take away the farm and the city could not survive. The farmer does not ask for, or want, charity, he does not want "hand-outs," but he does want consideration in the home and foreign markets that will insure him a fair price. FARMS AND FARMERS KEEP TOWNS ALIVE SOME YEARS AGO THE EDITOR EDI-TOR OF a weekly newspaper in Wisconsin Wis-consin made the statement, in a meeting of newspaper people in Milwaukee, Mil-waukee, that he never printed anything any-thing about farms or farmers in his columns. He said he did not wish to print uncomplimentary statements and as he could say nothing good of any farmer he declined to say any thing. Time cured that situation for the paper died, as it should. That editor failed to realize that it was the farms and farmers who brought the outside dollars to the town, that kept it alive. To have stopped the flow of these dollars would have meant the death of the town and the newspaper almost over night. ,, The people of every rural town are dependent de-pendent on the farms, not only for food, but for the continued inflowing of dollars that keep the town and its institutions functioning. JOBHOLDERS' RANKS ' GROW AND GROW . HOW THE ARMY OF FEDERAL CIVILIAN jobholders does grow! In March of 1939 the total number of such employees was 911,000. A year later, in March of 1940, the number num-ber had increased to slightly over 948,000. Then the number of new jobs began really going up. and in March of 1941 had reached a total of 1,239,000. In another year the number was 1,967,000. In May of 1943 the figure was 3.132,000. That is 62,000 more than the total number of employees of all the states, counties and municipalities, including police and school teachers and those employed em-ployed in municipally owned utilities of all kinds. It takes a lot of federal government bureaus to employ such a vast army of people. ONCE EACH FOUR YEAF.S WE AMERICANS have a family row in which we are now indulging. We question each other's integrity or sanity; we call each other names and make wild charges of evil intent; in-tent; we get In each other's hair in a bad way. It has all the evidence evi-dence of a really serious knock down and drag out fight. Then next November No-vember 7 we will count the casualties, casual-ties, wipe off the blood, clean Up the mess, and again settle dowr as that happy American family the people peo-ple of the world admire. |