4—Lancaster Fanning, Friday, April 21, 1956 Lancaster County’s Own Farm Weekly Newspaper Established November 4, 1955 Published every Friday by OCTORARO NEWSPAPERS Quarryville, Pa. Phone 378 Lancaster Phone 4-3047) Alfred C. Alspach Ernest J. Neill C. Wallace Abel Robert G. Campbell Robert J. Wiggins Subscription Rates: $2.00 Per Year Three Years $5.00; 5c Per Copy Entered as Second-Class matter at the Post Office, Quarryville, Pa , under Act of March 3, 1879 FARM BILL REACTION Something'more than a tempest in a teapot has boiled up since the Presidential veto of the farm bill, as much a ruckus as the measure produced before it was rejected. , Statewide, Pennsylvania reaction has, been for and against. Here are some quotations William L. Henning, state" secretary of agriculture: “To me this (veto) looks like an election year move . . . Apparently the President did hot like the farm bill with amendments, but x I cannot understand why he immediately raised price supports when Secretary (of Agriculture Ezra Taft) Benson was pledged to flexible supports.”' J. Collins McSparran, executive secretary, Penn sylvania State Grange: “We are disappointed in the veto for one reason. We feel the domestic parity program should have been allowed to be tried on a domestic commodity. Anything over that (domestic human consumption) would be sold in any channel, for the going price. Neither rigid price supports, nor flexible price supports help the Penn sylvania farmer. What we need in the farm situation is a complete change in.the approach to agricultural problems.” C. M. Wilson, executive secretary, Pennsylvania Farmers Association: “This bill as passed by Congress was deterimental to Pennsylvania farmers. In fact it would have worked to the direct disadvantage of most of the state’s farm economy” , Miles Horst, Republican State Committee Chair man and former state secretary: “I think the farmers of Pennsylvania are in accord with President Eisenhower in his approach to this farm problem. We are a deficiency producing state from the standpoint of feed material. That farm bill, as vetoed, provided features that instead of re lieving the situation we have today would have increased the problem and made it more serious.” Both President Eisenhower and Secretary Benson placed themselves in a vulnerable position politically, and are to be commended for their courage in taking that chance. To compose a measure that would apply equally to all farmers all over the country would be an immense undertaking. ' Always the farm problem will be a political prob lem, and like the old saying: There’s no business like show business” it might be said “There’s no problem like the farm problem.” SOIL BANK ADVANCES Now that the omnibus farm measure has been turn ed down by the Depatment of Agriculture and by Presi dential veto, work on the Soil Bank proposal has moved ahead with‘an appropriation of $1,200,000,000. But Secretary Benson says he has no authority to spend the monies. Then there are prospects some Southern crops, already planted, would need be plowed under for farmers to benefit from the program. This latest proposal must still meet another trip through the Senate and be signed by the President before it can become effective. But its success, both factions will admit, depends wholly on proper administration. Idled acres can fit well in the program of a 1,000- acre Corn Belt farm or a 30,000-acre western wheat farm, but with the average size of farms in Lancaster County far under 100 acres, there’s little place for soil banking, as proposed,.here. ANOTHER PENDULUM SWING The midwest is swinging more support to the Demo crat party in hopes of solving a farm problem that is be coming more acute. Early indications of this were indicat ed in letters to Lancaster Farming, and the enthusiastic cry of “Give ’em H—, Harry” has been heard again. Midwestern farms are in a state of determined un rest lowa farm incomes have dropped 50 per cent. Returns on livestock for each $lOO worth of feed tumbled as much As 32 per cent. Cash incomes on 148 farms slipped accord ing to the following figures: 1953 $10,247; 1954 $8,269; 1955 $7,051 Gross value of crops per acre fell to $57 last year, from $6B in 1954, $64 in 1953. , Cattle replacement costs are forecast higher this year, adding to an outlook of further loss, an outlook of further discontent. STAFF . Business Manager Advertising Director Circulation Director 50 Years Ago This Week on Lancaster Farms 50 YEARS AGO (1906) By JACK REICHARD Families on Lancaster farms were interested in the case of Charles Musselman, farmer near Coopersburg, Pa, whose farmhouse was robbed while the family was at work in the fields. When one of the children re turned to the house one of the robbers fired at her. The girl ran out of her home and called to the family, and the tlheves ran off with their loot. Later that day a man passed the farm and the girl recognized him as the thief who had fired at her. A chase followed and after about a mile across fields the man was cornered in the barn of a neighbor. The infuriated father and neigh bors got a rope and threa tened to hang the intruder, who got down on his knees, begging and praying not to be lynched. Publisher .. Editor After some deliberation the prisoner was turned over to the authorities and placed in the Coopersburg lockup Later he was removed to the Allentown 3 ail for trial. Pennsylvania Gold Rush Or 1906 The belief that South Moun tain contained gold, silver and other precious metals, sent prices of farm land in Cumber land County_ skyward 50 years ago, attracting dozens of capita lists from 'Harrisburg, Philadel phia and New York to the re gion. Among prospectors in specting lands in the Dillsburg area was Thomas A. Edison. Im mediately after his visit the Hedges farms, .which had been advertised for sale a few weeks before at $5,000, were sold for $50,000. The largest purchaser of * land in the Huntsdale sec tion was James M- Cameron, Harrisburg, who hail more than 50 deeds recorded, ac- 1 cording to a news dispatch. A. P. Zeigler, who had pur chased 160 acres from County Commissioner Harmon, of Mount Holly Springs, at $7OO an acre, offered $2,500 an acre. Farmers who had struggled for years to wrest a living from the soil suddenly found them selves agriculturalists without farms, but with large bank ac counts. A number of other farm ers refused to sell while pros pectors daily scoured the moun tain for “pay dirt”, which never materialized ** > t California farmers in the Woodbridge area, along the Mok lelum Kiver, were highly pleased with the outcome in their sec tion resulting from the 1906 earthquake. The bed of the riv er there had dropped 12 feet, providing a deeper channel for flood runoffs, greatly reducing the danger of flooding their lands. Mrs Joseph L. Garrett, West Fallowfield, was found dead in a field on her husband’s Penn sylvania farm. Wien the men re turned to the house for dinner that day, they found Mrs. Gar rett had made no preparation for the meal and immediately went in search of her. Her body was found in a field, where she had gone to feed the turkeys. J* * w Fattened Oysters On Corn Down along the Chesapeake Bay, in Maryland, they were fat tening oysters on corn, just as Lancaster farmers were fatten ing their hogs. The oysters were placed in cool cellars, wet down with salt water and cornmeal sprinkled over the piles, which it was stated they greedily de voured. V A » The New Holland Machine Works in Lancaster County did a $120,000 business in 1905, turning out 1,000 feed mills, 400 wood saws and 299 gasoline engines. A dividend of six per cent was 'declared by the company that year. 25 Years Ago The discovery of irregulari ties at several plants buying milk from farmers on the but terfat basis, prompted the De partment of Agriculture to in augurate a check-up on the method of testing in milk plants throughout the State There were over 1300 milk plants and receiving stations in Pennsylvania, in 1931, and most of them paid for milk and cream on the bufterfat basis. State officials staged a great m3ustice could be done the dairy industry by incorrect tests. The small fraction of one per cent of under-reading meant a loss of 8 to 10 cents per 100 pounds of milk produced. The Department ruled that where money was taken from farmers through under-reading tests, it would have to be paid Church Must Grow Lesson for April 29, 1956 A CLUB can close its member ship list at any time. It can decide not to accept any more new members for six years, or sixty. But if a church decides to do the same, it is not a church any more, only a club. A church that is for good reasons not growing may be a true church of Christ; but a church that does not want to grow is certainly no church that Christ would recognize. “GO,” Jesus said. into all the world. A church that has no Go about it, a church whose ho- rizon is limited by its own parking lot, a church with out an outreach, Dr. Foreman is a parody on a true chUrch. It is not the real thing. Hurdles and Handicaps The early Christian church was surely the real thing. It was a going, and_ therefore a growing, church. But it could have had, if it wanted, all the mouldy ex cuses which lazy churches offer nowdfeys to explain why they don’t reach out. For example, the early Christians could have said, “We can’t reach out, we haven’t any money.” But they managed to get around, or at any .rate some of them did. They could have com plained, “We have a shortage of ministers.” Well, they did, but they had no shortage of laymen. By the time the distinguished apostles got down to Samaria they found an enthusiastic layman Philip had been there already and got a work started. The church could have said, “We can’t afford to send missionaries all the way to Africa.” They couldn’t, to be sure. But what they could do was to make a Christian of an African in their own country, trusting that he would take the gospel back to his own people. (And he did, the tradition tells us.) A track man does not complain about seeing hurdles in front of him; he jumps over- them. A good golfer does , ' < <>• 1 h Background Scripture: Acts B‘4-40, Devotional Reading: Luke 10.1-9. back. Plant owners prosecuted on a - second offense lost their license. * H State Secretary of Agri culture. John A. McSparran, called the attention of farm ers to the importance of growing alfalfa, cow-peas and soy beans, during 1931, to grind and substitute for "some of the high-priced pro tein feeds commonly pur chased. H * Twenty-five years ago this week, the Lancaster County Drouth Committee, comprised o£ Leslie Bolton, Holtwood KD 1; C A Raezer, Ephrata, and Al bert Risser, Bambridge, sat at the Lancaster postoffice build irig to receive applications for loans for the purchase of seed, fertilizers, feed and tractor fuel. A chattel mortgage was security for loans. =, i Lancaster Farm Women Society No. 11 met with Mrs. Abner Musser, Buck, “the Biggest Little Town in U-S.A.”, Thursday after- April 30, 1931. '' <• *» According to a 1931 bulletin, issued by farm crop specialists at State College, sweet clover, seeded alone early in the spring on good land adapted to it, should make good grazing after mid-summer. Seeded m grain, sweet clover need most of the first year s growth to make sufficient root, it was stated not “go home mad” because ho has to play with a handicap against him. He takes it as a com pliment and a challenge. So the early church took their hurdles and handicaps as challenges. - Laymen and Clergy When you see a present-day church vath no outreach, one of the reasons may be that the people leave all the outreaching to the minister. He is supposed: to be interested m missions, sure,| that’s his business. But the people —well, we have a hard enough! time raising money with our ba-| zaar just for the preacher’s salary,, you can’t expect us to thinki about missions! In fact, one has seen churches where the only really “active member” was the preacher. .Now the early Chris tians talked no such nonsense. They did hot have the hard-and fast division into “laity” and “clergy” that churches today have, even if they use other words like “member” and “preacher,” or “pew holder” and “pulpit orator.” The Apostles, it is tiue, were men 1 set apart. But the outreach of the early church was mostly done by people who weie not Apostles. And so far as we hear in the book of Acts, the Apostles did not dress differently from any one else.' They did not claim exemption from taxation, they did not claim reduced rates at stores or when traveling. They were not given titles like Reverend or Doctor,— everybody called them just Paul or Peter or whatever, without so much as a “Mr.” in fiont of their names. They worked at outreach, yes, but the point is, they were not looked on as professional out reachers while the “laymen” were professional sit-backers! , Multitudes and Lonely Man The early church reached out in two ways. They went where the crowds were, and also they went to far lonely places. We hear about crowds in Jerusalem and Samaria and elsewhere. We also have the story of Philip going down to a desert road where hxs only congregation was one lonely puzzled foreigner. The going church today, the outreach mg church, the New Testament kind of church, also will be reach ing out to the multitudes, and to the lonely man. It will be pending missionaries into gieat cities, in our land and overseas, working among overcrowded tenements and swarming streets. It will be reaching out to cowhands on the open ranges, to lighthouse keep ers’ families along the seacoast, to little villages on the edge of the Arctic and under the dripping tropical rainforests. (Bated on outline copyrighted Of the Division of Christian Education* Na tional Council of the Churches of Christ In the U, S. A. Released hf CommnnUr Meiitorvitt.) J 1
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers