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The Franklin Times
December 25, 1909

General News Items.

Happenings of the Past Week Boiled
Down for the Times Readers

    The Illinois legislature met in extra session on the 14th.
     Burglars on the 15th dynamited the vault of the Paoli State Bank at Paoli, Okla., and escaped with $4,000.
     $122,867.93 of Oklahoma's cash is tied up by the failure of the Farmers' National bank of Tulsa, Okla., on the 14th.
     A wreck occurred on the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern railroad on the night of the 14th in which three persons were killed and fifteen injured.
     A negro was rushed off to Mount Vernon, Ill., from Mount Carmel last Wednesday night to escape a mob who was bent on putting him to death for having entered the home of a widow woman and shot her to death.
     The declaration of the United States Steel corporation that in the future they will no longer recognize organized labor unions has started a war against the corporation by the American federation of labor.
     More than 150 physicians from Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana assembled in Gulfport, Miss., on the 14th at a special meeting of the Harrison county Medical So. at the rooms of the Gulfport Commercial Club and began the study of pellagra.
     General Clement A. Evans of Atlanta, GA., commander-in-chief of the United Confederate veterans, has pledged the support of his organization to the building of a $2,500,000 George Washington memorial hall at Washington, D. C., in a letter to Mrs. Henry F. Dimock, who is heading a movement to provide adequate quarters for all national, patriotic and other societies.
     Just before a train reached Clarkston, Ga., Thursday a driving rod of the engine broke, knocking the fireman unconscious and almost demolishing the cab.  Escaping steam from broken pipes poured into the cab and before he could reach the emergency brakes Engineer Davis was driven from his seat.  Nevertheless he clung to the outside of the cab until he had grasped the lever and stopped the train.  Then he fell unconscious from his perilous position.
     That the five masted schooner Governor Ames, bound from Brunswick, Ga., to New York, with a large cargo of railroad crossties, grounded and went to pieces off Wimble Shoals, twenty-five miles north of Cape Hatteras, Monday afternoon, the captain, his wife and the crew of twelve men all being lost, is the story told by Josiah Spearing, the sole survivor of the wreck, who was carried to Charleston, S. C. on the 15th by the steamship Shawmut, of the Southern Steamship Company.
     Last Wednesday morning before most of the passengers in two sleeping cars had been awakened, and while the occupants of two passenger coaches were just beginning to stir about after a night's ride, the four cars of train No. 11 of the Southern railway were dashed down a fifty-foot embankment from Reedy Fork trestle, ten miles from Reidsville, N. C., and twelve miles north of Greensboro killing ten men , and injuring thirty-five other passengers.  The cars that left the track landed in a creek which flowed beneath the trestle.
     In a fire which destroyed a large tenement house in Cincinnati, Ohio, on the 14th seven persons lost their lives, three will die and twelve others were seriously injured.

     Plenty of hog and hominy should be the motto of every farmer next year.  Whenever the time comes that the southern farmers raise all of their meat and bread at home then you will see the south bloom and the "fritter trees and honey pond" will not only be found in Texas but in Alabama as well.

     Fifteen cent cotton looks mighty good to the southern farmer, but my, how much better that price would be if every corn crib and smoke house was well filled? 

   A new era of progressive farming is now on in the south through the efforts of the various agricultural departments of the nation and states.  During the past year thousands of dollars were contributed in prizes for the best acres of corn, oats, wheat, cotton, etc. to say nothing of the interest manifested in stock.

The Coming Man.

     The boy who operates a telegraph instrument is a smart boy.  The boy who can solve the most difficult problems, or read Greek or Latin is accomplished, but when it becomes to be a blessing to his country, the boy who pulls the bell cord on "Old Beck" is the power behind the throne.  The dust may settle on perspiration of his body; the gravel may get inside of his shoes; he may be called rude or boisterous; he may not be what "society" calls "polished," but he has a heart as true as steel; a courage as strong as will which finds a way to do things.   He is the country's salvation because he produces something which sustains life in the world and without which all other forms of human activity would perish. 
          ---Alex City Outlook 

The Franklin Times
December 25, 1909

     On January 1st the amendment to our road laws go into effect and also the wheel tax law.  If you wish to pay $5.00 in cash instead of working ten days on the public roads you can do it before the 15th day of February.  It is important that you pay your wheel tax before the 15th day of February.  Watch out for the day that the public roads superintendent will be in your beat.

     A number have already expressed the desire to fill the several offices for which gentlemen will be chosen next year.  Frank N. Julian of Colbert county, is mentioned as one of the probable candidates for membership on the railroad commission of Alabama.

     The prevailing opinion among many prominent democrats of the state is that the general primary election should not be held earlier than August.  We can see no good for having a primary before the latter part of August.

     A mortgage in the sum of $75,000 was Tuesday filed in the probate office at Tuscumbia for record, the instrument being executed by the North Alabama Rolling Mill company of Sheffield, to the Sheffield Trust company, as trustee, to secure an issue of bonds in the said amount of $75,000, and pledging as security therefore the property of the rolling mill company in Sheffield.

     Attacks on the original statewide prohibition bill which emanated from Mobile interest, were finally silenced Thursday when the supreme court denied the application for a rehearing in the case of George H. Hervey against Prince Williams, Jr., probate judge of Mobile county.  Hervey, a hotel proprietor, endeavored to secure a license to sell liquor from  Judge Williams, soon after the statewide bill went into effect.  It was denied, and he attempted to mandamus the official.

     Farmers, Attention.

     The farmer in the north and west grows grain, hay, hogs, cattle, mules and horses.  His land is worth $100 to $200 per acre.  He has never raised any crops but those named above.  He has money in the bank.  His barns, dwellings and fences are far better than ours.  He is buying land in the south by the thousands of acres every year.  Did you ever consider why his condition financially is so much better than ours?  It is simply this, he grows food crops and live stock.  From his own crops, he takes a good living for his family and what he sells is mainly so much money to put in the bank or to invest.  Did you ever figure how much better off you would now be if each year that you have farmed, you had first raised your corn, hay, meat, one or more mule colts to supply your needs for plow stock and then, after these things, as much cotton as you could?  If not, do this:  You must figure.  Your merchant and banker could not get along without figuring on their business, and you must figure on yours.  If you will in 1910, first raise everything you need, including garden and chickens, you will find that the proceeds of your cotton crop will, in the main, be surplus money which you can invest.  Don't blame the farmer in the north and west because he is getting rich off of us; don't blame the government; don't blame your landlord or your merchant, but give this matter your careful consideration.  If you find that this suggestion is right, then put it into practice.  You know, and we know, that the south can raise its corn, hay, hogs and mules.  Let us own our fault, mend our slack farming, produce our food crops for 1910 and be independent.
   --Memphis Commercial Appeal.

Dr. Knapp Will Take up
Educational Campaign.

     Washington, December 14. -- A somewhat unique campaign of education is to be undertaken in January by Dr. S. A. Knapp of the department of agriculture, in charge of the farm demonstration work in the south, which will have for its purpose a discussion of the farm methods and policies of the various states visited and the means for bringing about greater agricultural prosperity.  The trip is being arranged by the Southern railway and is undertaken at the suggestion of that company.
     There will be a series of eight or nine addresses, each treating directly of the agricultural work and conditions in the community or state in which it is delivered., the entire series making a collective study of farm life, methods, opportunities and possibilities in the southeastern states which will _____(?)* attract wide attention.
     Dr. Knapp is one of the leading agricultural authorities of the country, and has an intimate knowledge of farm conditions, of soils and all that pertains to southern agriculture, and his past work has been one of the chief influences in the advance in crop diversification which has taken place in the recent years in the south.
     As at present arrangements meetings will be held at Lynchburg, Va.; Charlotte, N. C.; Greenville, S. C.; Macon, Ga.; Jacksonville, Fla.; Anniston and Huntsville, Ala., West Point and Greenville, Miss.; Memphis, Tenn., and Lexington, Ky.

*Word not legible. 

The Franklin Times
December 25, 1909

   What say you about having a county fair next fall?

     Are you preparing to carry gladness and sunshine to some heart Christmas day.  Make some one happy and see if happiness does not come to your heart.

Lets raise a number of prizes for the boys' corn clubs in Franklin county and next fall have a small county fair.  It will do our county good and what benefits the county will be of advantage to us all.

     At an early date the Times hopes to see a movement launched for the holding of a county fair in Russellville next fall.  From expressions of prominent men we are confident that there would be no trouble to secure contributions of sufficient number of prizes to pay all farmers who will take interest enough to bring their products to the fair for exhibition.  Of course for the first two or three years we could not expect to have as big a exhibition as some of the larger counties but we feel confident if our people will start in now to make preparations they would be surprised at what they could show.  Our county will soon have some of the finest orchards in the south, she now has a number of small canning factories, many fine horses and mules and judging by the number of beef cattle shipped from Russellville, Franklin county could make a nice exhibit of beef cattle.  What say our farmer friends about trying to have a county fair next fall?

If the Farm Falls--The Deluge.

     "The truth is, if I were advising a young man in this country as to his future profession, I should say to him that there was probably a greater opportunity for real reward in the profession of agriculture than in any other profession this country affords," -- President Taft, at Jackson, Miss.
     "When the forest are all cut down and the mines are nothing but empty holes in the ground, the farm lands of the country will remain capable of renewing their bounty forever.
     Here lies the true secret of our anxious interest in agricultural methods; because:  in the long run, they mean life or death to future millions, who are not strangers or invaders, but our own children's children, and who will pass judgment upon us according to what we have made of the world in which their lot is to be cast." -- James J. Hill in "World's Work."
     These two expressions are from men with the broadest conceivable opportunities for accurate observation and reasoning.
     Conjointly, they sum up the question of agricultural education and of the issue, "back to the farm," wish a big simplicity intelligible to the most casual student of our present and our national destiny.
     Mr. Hill's summary climaxes a remarkable article.  In it he mercilessly analyses the drift from the farm to the city, the folly of spendthrift cultural methods the wantonness of soil depletion and shows that, unless checked the end of all this is, as inevitably as sunrise, national and individual decadence, national and individual bankruptcy
     There is no middle course; no pleasant invoking on the complaint "some more convenient season's plea for delay; no waving sway of the indictment as the product of hysteria or of faddism.
     The process has already set in.  It is testified in ruinously high cost of living, in increasing poverty of farm labor, in city congestion and rural scarity*.
     And if the farm fails -- then the deluge.  For the fertility of the farm is the keystone to the nation's greatness, its very existence; it is impossible to name a single industrial, economic or social activity that does not, in the final analysis, depend for its lifeblood upon the partnership of the man and the generous acres.
     Into the startling picture painted by Hill, comes the more inspiring light of President Taft's statement.  Men are going back to the farm.  Slowly, perhaps in insufficient numbers, but still they are going.
     Not in the history of the nation has the ingenuity of man worked with greater mathematical precision to reach a situation of real menace.  Improved cultural methods, rural free delivery, good roads, the railroad, the trolly*, the telephone, high prices for products -- all these have combined to diminish rural isolation, to place the man in the country more upon an equality with the man in the city and to remove the leading factors in the urbanwise movement and the enhancing problem of simple sustenance.
     "Reform" movements ad nauseam have risen and dwindled in this country.  Paramount to them all, greater than any of the political issues with which demagogues lash passion, is the primary one of the endangered American farm---Atlanta Constitution.

*typed as in article.