Читать книгу The Young Farmer: Some Things He Should Know - Thomas Forsyth Hunt - Страница 8

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In the last chapter were discussed the most common methods by which a young man acquires an opportunity to engage in farming. This chapter will discuss some less common arrangements by which may be bridged that period between the time the son is ready to go into the business and the time he may assume the complete control of the ancestral or other farm. It will also suggest a method for the continuous business management of a farm enterprise.

As stated, the most common reason for a farm changing from one family to another is the fact that no heir is willing to assume the obligation which is involved in paying for the interest of the other heirs. Connected with this problem is the further fact that the father is not usually ready to give up the management of the farm at the time one of his sons reaches the age to go into active business.

The reason for this state of affairs is made clear by the results of insurance statistics. The period that a man may be expected to live can be obtained by taking the difference between his present age and 90 and dividing the remainder by two. Thus, a young man who is 20 may reasonably expect to live 35 years, or until he is 55 years old. A man at 50, however, still has an expectation of life of 20 years, and the man of 70 of 10 years.

A farmer of 50 will usually have one or more sons ready to go to farming if they ever expect to engage in farming. But, as has been shown, a man of 50 has a reasonable expectation of 20 more years of life and cannot turn over the farm to his son, completely, without destroying his own opportunity for earning a livelihood. As things are usually arranged, therefore, there is no place on the average farm for the son, except as a hired hand, which is not desired permanently by either father or son.

Frequently the father fails to appreciate the earning power of his son, and, what is more important, that the boy has grown into a man. One day a teacher called a student of agriculture to his office, when the following conversation occurred:

John Armstrong, Austinburg, Ashtabula county, Ohio, was a dairy tenant farmer for twenty years with nothing to show for his labor but a debt of $500. He then bought the farm of 144 acres on which he lives, without cash payment, assuming a debt of $7,000. At the end of ten years he owned his farm and equipment valued at $20,000. He has two sons who have been important factors in his success. A year ago one of them married and went to a farm of his own, the father paying him $3,000 for his former labor.

John M. Hunt, Ackley, Iowa, two years a student at Iowa State College. He returned to the home farm of 120 acres, which, without any capital, he rented from his father. At the age of 25 his gross receipts from this farm were a little over $4,000. After paying rent, living, keeping a family of four, a few trips to fairs and corn shows, he had net $1,500 for his years work. Picture shows home with father, mother and sister in the foreground.

The Bureau of Soils at Washington, said the teacher, has asked me to recommend several of our students to them for positions as field assistants. If you desire to have me do so, I would be glad to recommend you for one of these positions. The compensation is $1,000 a year and field expenses.

I do not believe that I can accept, said Mr. Manning, my father is in poor health and needs my help on the farm.

Does your father want you to take charge of the farm and manage it so that you can make your training count?

No; my father expects to continue to manage the farm. He wishes me to work for him.

How much does your father expect to pay you?

Thirty dollars a month.

The teacher found it extremely difficult not to interfere, but he merely said, This is a case of filial duty which you must settle for yourself. I must have nothing further to say.

The young man returned to the ancestral home and is probably still there. It is, of course, impossible to determine the merits of an individual case, but this incident represents a type of cases where the son makes two important sacrifices from the sense of duty.

First, he sacrifices present, and, perhaps, future opportunity to earn the wages of which he is capable and to which he is justly entitled. And, second, and more important, he sacrifices the opportunity to develop his own powers and make concrete his own abstract self.

There are two things that every young man should do. One is to earn a living. A man that cannot or does not earn a living is of no value to himself or to anyone else. The other is to develop within himself his latent possibilities. He must apply himself to some problem, or problems, and through them develop his own personality. There is no place where more intricate and satisfying problems may be found than in the development of a successful farming enterprise. In the instance cited, the father may have been unable to pay his son the wage he might have obtained elsewhere, but he did not need to dwarf his sons development by treating him merely as a hired hand. His willingness to do so was probably due to his failure to appreciate that his son had become a man.

Sometimes a father is astute enough to reorganize his business so as to retain a place for himself while giving to his sons that opportunity which every man must have who develops himself normally.

An Ohio farmer once came to the Deans office. He had a son in college who was just completing the first year of a two years course in agriculture.

I should like to have you find a place for my son in a cheese factory during the coming summer, said Mr. McKinley.

I own a farm of 130 acres on which I have a herd of Jersey cattle, continued the father. I have two sons and one daughter. I would like to have my sons about me, but there is no place for them on my farm because I am there and cannot get away. In fact, I do not desire to give up the management of the farm and the development of the herd of cattle.

Not every father sees the situation as clearly as you do, interjected the Dean.

This is my plan. After my son has spent a summer in a cheese factory, I want him to come back to your school for another year. I want him to learn, especially, all you teach about dairying. I will then build a cheese factory on my own farm and my son will make into cheese the milk of my own herd, and also from the herds of our neighbors. By the time he has completed his work with you, my younger son will have finished the high school. He has some liking for trading, and he will sell the cheese at wholesale and deliver it to the surrounding towns where markets are unexcelled. As for the daughter, continued this practical man, she will get married and that will take care of her.

What became of the daughter is not known to the writer, but the rest of the program was carried out successfully and continued for many years.

A German came to this country and settled in New Jersey, where he established a large orchard. In course of time his two sons grew into manhood. While, of course, requiring plenty of laborers, the orchardist did not need the sons in the management of his farm. He, therefore, established one of these sons in the commission business in Philadelphia, thus, at least, keeping the profits on the sale of the products of his orchard in the family. He also needed cold storage for his fruit. The other son started a cold storage plant, which plays an important part in the profitable management of the orchard. Thus both sons have independent employment requiring managerial ability and the orchard is much more profitable than it otherwise would be.

Our land laws, our traditions and our practices are based upon the idea that a farm is to provide activity and support for but one family. In order, therefore, that the son may marry and begin to develop his life in his own way, it is essential to reorganize in some manner the method of managing the farm or to enlarge or, perhaps, specialize its activities. This may be accomplished on a simple partnership basis, or it may be in some such line as outlined in the illustrations which have been given. In other occupations such co-operative effort is the rule rather than the exception. That it is more difficult to effect satisfactory arrangements in farming must be conceded, else they would be more common. Doubtless it will often tax the ingenuity of father and son to devise the plans best suited to meet their particular problem.

There still remains to consider another form of business relation as applied to farming which has become almost universal in trade and transportation. The following incident may illustrate and emphasize the problem better than abstract discussion: One day a man walked into an office and stated that a friend had a half million dollars to invest in farming, provided that he could be convinced that the money would be invested profitably.

Does your friend desire to buy land in any particular locality?

Yes, replied the promoter, he wishes to buy land near——. He has some sentiment about it. He was born in that neighborhood.

Well, that is a rather bad beginning. Farming on sentiment is dangerous, especially when the sentiment is in no way related to the business.

The facts were that the region indicated was recognized to be one of the most unpromising sections of the state.

If you undertake to invest a half million dollars in one neighborhood, continued the adviser, you will pretty certainly fail to earn interest on your investment.

Why? inquired the promoter.

Before you could possibly buy any considerable part of the land the owners of the farms you desire to buy would have doubled or perhaps trebled the price asked for their holdings. It is one thing to earn interest on an investment of $30 an acre and quite another to earn an equal per cent on $60 or $90 an acre.

In the second place, farmers are content to accept less per cent on their capital than they would if it was loaned at interest, because the farm furnishes a home as well as a business. When you buy up all these farms and convert them into a single enterprise you will destroy their home value. You cannot hope to compete with the man, who, because his farm furnishes him a home, is content with an otherwise small return on his investment.

There were other reasons, of course, why such an enterprise would fail, which the speaker did not stop to explain.

You are mistaken, challenged the promoter. I intend to meet both your objections. My plan is to form a corporation and issue both preferred and common stock. The preferred stock shall bear 5% and that will belong to my friend who furnishes the money. I will retain the common stock. Five per cent is all the owner of the money is entitled to, while if the business returns more than that amount, it will be due to my management. I, and those associated with me, are entitled to all that is made above five per cent. By retaining the common stock the surplus income will come to us. Neither will I destroy the home value, because I shall associate the former owners with me in the conduct of the estate and may give them some of the common stock, so that they will be interested with me in making a profitable return. If they wish to keep their money invested in the farm, they will be given preferred stock in place of cash for their farms.

It is needless to say that the promoter never convinced his friend that he could successfully invest for him a half million dollars along the lines indicated. Nevertheless the corporate plan is not without merit. For example, if a father should incorporate his farm, he could provide for the inheritance of the preferred stock, among the heirs, as he desires. He could give to the son who operates the farm all the common stock, together with what preferred stock he is entitled or the father may desire him to have. The common stock would provide the means by which the income from the farm, which was due to the sons skill and management, might go to him. As time went on the son could acquire additional preferred stock from the father or other heirs, or he could invest his earnings elsewhere, as might seem most expedient. On the death of the parents, the preferred stock would be distributed as inheritance or the will provided without in any way interfering with the continuity of the farm enterprise. If at any time the son desired to discontinue the management of the farm, all he would need to do would be to dispose of his interest in the common stock at whatever he might be able to secure from the man who succeeded to its management. He could sell or retain his preferred stock.

Farming is the one remaining great industry that has not been organized so that a single enterprise may have a continuous existence. A corporation never dies, but at least three generations of men occupy the farms of the United States each century.