d
The news in this publica
tion is released for the press on
receipt.
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
NEWS LETTER
Published weekly by the
University of North Carolina
for its Bureau of Elxtcnsion.
APRIL 2,1919
CHAPEL HILL, N. C.
VOL. V, NO. 19
Editorial Board i B. C. Branson, J. G. deR. Hamilton, L. B. Wilson, D. D. Carroll, G. M. MoKie
Entered as second-class matter November 14, 1914, at the |Postofflee at Chapel Hill, N, C., undbr the act of August 24, 1912.
THE FAR HORIZON
It is our fortune to be called upon to
aet our part as public men at a most in
teresting era in human affairs. Not only
new interests and new relations have
sprung up among the states, but new so
cieties, new nations, and families of na
tions have risen to take their places and
perform their parts, in the order and the
intercourse of the world.
Every man aspiring to the character of
a statesman must endeavor to enlarge
his views to meet this new state of things.
He must aim at adequate comprehension,
and, instead of being satisfied with that
narrow political sagacity, which, like the
power of minute vision, sees small things
accurately, but can see nothing else, he
must look to the far horizon, and em
brace, in his broad survey, whatever
the series of recent events has brought
into connection, near or remote, with
the country whose interest he studies to
serve.—-Webster, Speech on Mission to
Panama.
LOOKING AHEAD SOMEWHAT
You, who are toiling your way through
the income tax schedules, or directing
your uneasy reflections upon your bank
balance, well bled; you, who look forward
into the future and see plainly fifteen or
twenty such experiences awaiting you
before your share in the colossal folly of
Europe has been fully liquidated: what
do you honestly think of the politician
who grinds out like a pre-war phono
graphic record the saw that America and
Europe are two worlds, having no com-
anon concern?
If there had been no doctrine of Amer
ican isolation, taken seriously by Ger
many, there would have been no war.
There would have been twenty million
less graves in Europe. Some two hun
dred billions wasted in war would have
beep functioning as productive capital.
But let bygones be bygones. You have
a greater concern in the future. Canyon
conceive any power that will prevent the
whole of Europe east of the Rhine from
fusing into one mass, bitterly hating you
And your institutions, unless the new
states now arising are sheltered and guid
ed into full independence and national
pre^perity?
There are politicians who say that is no
■concern of yours. Look at your income
tax schedules; liow would you like their
rates quadrupled? Thatiswhatis com
ing, unless you take thought.—The New
Republic.
folk—a wonder field for the maker of plays
and songs of our jjeople.
Already a number of interesting plays
have been written in the University
course in Dramatic Composition, three of
whicli were presented on March 14 and 15
in the iday-House in Chapel Hill. These
are native plays in the full sense of the
word—plays of the mountain people, of
negro types, of village and plantation
life, of the fisher folk—written by native
sons and daughters of Carolina. Tliere
remains to be written the many-sided
drama of tlie tiirilling new life of Caj-oii-
na today—of her contribution to America.
The Play-House is to be an insti
tution of cooperative folk-arts. Its ad
justable stage, its scenery, lighting, set
tings, and costumes are liome-made,
designed and executed by our amateur
playmakers liere at Chapel Hill. >
It was conceived by the imagination of
Youth, built by the sons and daughters
of Carolina, and now dedicated by tliem
to all the people.
Being adjustable and portable, the
stage equipment! of The Play-House
may be readily adapted to any town liall
or school auditorium. We are hoping
tliat it may serve tlie people everywhere
as a radial center, a creative center—that
it may carry on the idea of folk playmak
ing through the state, and beyond—that
it may help to make the people of Caroli
na (to use President Graham’s beautiful
phrase) ‘ ‘productive and\happy. ’ ’ —Fred
erick H. Koch, University of North Car
olina.
THE PLAYMAKERS
Tie dramatic impulse is born in every
iM»n, and play is the universal expression
■»{ tJ»e creative iiistincl. It has given to
the peoples of the world an enduring voice
—a iei>ul)lic of active literature—in tlie
pl.«yti of a Sophocles, of a Shakespeare, of
» Moliere, of an Ibsen. These were literally
playmakers of the t>eople, expressers of
tho common life in enduring beauty—in
p»eh y.
Ill the new day tiiat is dawning, there
are ev’ery wliere signs of an awakened folk
consciousness yearning for fresh expres
stoii of the common life. To give form
to this awakening impulse of the people
in terms of play, “the purest and most
spiritual activity of mankind,” is the aim
of The Carolina Playmakers.
EKpreasion alone will satisfy the heart
•of man and give him an abiding liappi-
Besa. Tlie individual finds his fullest
ex i>ressioa in giving the best that is in
him to the common good, his higliest
happiness in contributing to the common
happiness.
It is the aim of Tire Carolina Play-
niakers to translate the spirit of Caro
lj)»a into plays truly representative of the
.life of the people—of the folk of Carolina
The ilea is communal—an institution of
BeigIiborlines?;**of tlie common good and
the comraou happiness.
Caroiina from the mountains to the sea
offers rich store of tradition and romance
for the making of new literary and dra
matic forms fresh from the soil. Among
tliefw are the legends of the Lost Colony
and tlie Croatans; the tales of the intrepid
pirate, Blackbeafd; of such indomitable
^•ioneers as Daniel Boone, Flora McDon
aid, and the Town Builders of Old Salem,
the lore and balladry of tlie mountain
TRUE AS TRUTH
The warehouse Act passed by the I^eg-
islature of North Carolina in 1919 de
signed to benefit the cotton growers of the
State. It was passed upon the earnest
insistence of those most deeply interested
in the welfare of cotton growers. I hope
that much good will result from the act,
but I frankly confess that in my opinion
the only way the cotton grower can win
in his perpetual war with Wall Street is
to fight his battle behind breastworks of
bread and bacon. A warehouse may
enable him to win a single fight, but it
can never make him win a war.—Gov
ernor T. W. Bickett.
THE STOCKMAN
Behold tlie Stockman! Artist and
Artisan. He may be polished, or a
diamond in the rough—but always he
is a gem. Whose devotion to his ani
mals is second only to his love of God
and family. Whose gripping affection
is tempered only by his inborn sense
of the true proportion of things. W’ho
cheerfully braves personal discomfort
to make sure liis livestock suffer not.
To him there is rhythm in the clatter
of the horse’s hoof, music in the bleat
ing of the sheep, and in the lowing of
the herd. His approaching footsteps
call forth the affectionate wliinny of
recognition. His calm, well modulat
ed voice inspires confidence and wins
aflection. His coming is greeted with
demonstrations of pleasure, and his
going with evident disappointment.
W’ho sees something more in cows
than the drudgery of milking, more in
swine than the grunt and the. squal,
more in the liorse than the patient
servant, and more in sheep than the
golden hoof. Herdsman, shepherd,
groom—yes, and more. Broad-mind
ed, big hearted, whole souled; whose
life and character linger long after the
cordial greeting is stilled and the
hearty liandshake is but a memory,
whose silent influence forever lives.
May his kind multiply and replenish
the earth.—Herbert W. Mumford in
the Kansas Stockman.
UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
LETTER SERIES NO. 162
EQUAL BEFORE THE LAW
Our Declaration of Independence states
that we are all born free and equal. In
the eyer of the law this may be so. Act
ually it is not so. An instant ’ s reflection
shows the truth. One boy is born with
the inheritance of excellent health, a
strong constitution and hygienic home
surroundings; a second boy is born with
the inheritance of a throat full of adenoids,
a weak constitution and unhygienic sur
roundings. Evidently these two boys do
not even start out in life with an equal
chance.
Work of the School
Riglit here is where the work of the
school, public authority, should come in.
It becomes the duty of the public to see
that boy number two is taken in hand
and, by corrective measures, given as near
an equal chance with boy number one as
is humanly possible. The public, through
the school, owes it to that second boy to
see that equal opportunity is given him
to develop a strong body, a fine physique,
with the boy who is born with these ad
vantages.
Our Duty
The schools have here a duty which
they cannot neglect. We must have our
school physicians and our school nurses.
We cannot do our part in developing
mental life if we neglect the physical part
of pupil welfare.
Such an attitude implies more than
this also. We are in duty bound to keep
the physical conditions in and arournff
the schoolhouee such as will not only be
conducive to the maintenance of good
health but will also set the example be
fore the pupils of sanitary and hygienic
conditions. «
plants, better shipping conveniences, fa
cilities, and rates, cheaper credit, and
above all things a larger measure of co
operation in selecting and caring for
livestock and in producing and market
ing livestock and animal products to ad
vantage.
And ail the time they must bear in
mind the fundamental fact that the far
mers alone can settle none of their prob
lems. What is needed is the sympathetic
cooperation of consumers, merchants,
bankers, and railway authorities. Class
cooperation alone will not solve the prob
lem. The solution will be found in col
lusion not in collision. The agrarian
feeling that everything and everybody is
combined against the farmer is not the
largest view to take of the matter—nor
the wisest.
LIVESTOCK LEVELS
Last week we presented a table show
ing the hvestock levels of the states in
19U); at which time North Carolina was
nearly 75 percent below the level of even
a lightly stocked farm area, while her
rank was third from the bottom. Only
South Carolina and South Dakota—one a
cotton-mad and die other a wheat-crazy
state—made a poorer showing.
There are three levels in Agriculture:
(1) crop-farming merely or mainly, which
produces crude crop wealth only—cotton,
tobacco, or wheat, say, and reaps the
usual small profits that go to producers
of crude wealth of every sort, (2) live
stock farming based on food and feed
crops, as in Iowa and Wisconsin, and(3)
farm industries—creameries, condenser-
ies, cheese factories, packing plants,
flour and grist mills, cotton seed mills
and mixing plants, peanut, cotton, and
tobacco factories, and the like.
Farmers everywliere have the chance
to turn their own raw products into fin
ished forms for final consumption. In
Denmark they finish and market their
own farm products down to the last de
tail, and they do it in the only way in
which it can be done—tliat is to say, co
operatively. If farmers cannot or will
noLbunch up and develop their own farm
industries, then other people seize upon
the opportunity and of course reap the
larger profits that lie in finished commer
cial commodities, while the farmer’s
share of the consumer’s dollar remains
a mere bagatelle.
In 1915 two-thirds of our farm income
was derived from crop sales alone and on
ly one-third from the sale of livestock and
livestock products. In Iowa three-fourths
of the farm income arose from livestock
farming. Which is to say, we are crop
farmers merely or mainly while they are
livestock farmers with well developed
farm industries—creameries, cheese fac
tories, and the like. As a result the bank
account savings of Iowa were nearly five
times those of North Carolina. Indeed,
they were ten million dollars more than
tlie bank account savings of the nine cot
ton belt states combined.
Crop farmers are bound to remain poor
actually or relatively, no matter how
much they get for their cash crops in
fortunate years. When we learn to pro
duce cotton and tobacco on a home-pro
duced bread-and-meat basis the South
will be the richest farm area on the
globe.
For all the gains we have made since
1910, North Carolina is still on the bot
tom-most level of crop-farming. We are
moving upward into livestock farming
and farm industries, but we have a long
way to go before we stand alongside Iowa
and Wisconsin or Denmark and Holland
where the farmers are rich and dominate
the civilizations they create.
Low Levels in 1910
In this issue we present a table ranking
the counties of the state according to the
ratios between the number of farm ani
mals of all sorts on hand in 1910 and the
numbers required by lightly stocked
areas.
Livestock levels in North Carolina
range from 14 percent in Cumberland,
one of our great cotton counties, to 47
percent in Camden and Hyde, two tick-
infested counties in the tidewater coun
try. Really the counties that head the
list in North Carolina, both the quantity
and quality of livestock considered, are
Haywood, Alleghany, and Ashe. The
mid-state and western counties are mov
ing up rapidly in the number and breed
of beef and dairy cattle; while Alber-
marle counties are making the best show
ing of late in high-bred pigs and in pork
production—a thing that is generally true
of our peanut-sweet-potato-counties along
the Virginia border.
LIVESTOCK LEVELS IN CAROLINA
The counties arranged in order from high to low according to the percent of
livestock each county was sustaining in 1910 as compared with what it might sas-
tain on a lightly stocked basis; that is, one animal unit to every five acres. (A
heavily stocked area is one animal unit to every three acres).
An animal unit is one mature horse or mule, one milch cow or a two-year-old
steer; two other cattle; two yearling colts or tour spring colts; five hogs or ten pigs;
seven sheep or fourteen lambs; or 100 laying hens—so reckoned because they con
sume about the same amount of food.
The calculations were based on the acres of land in farms and the number of
farm animals of all kinds on hand in 1910 as these appear in the Federal Census of
that year; and the percents refer to the number not the quality of livestock.
H. M. HOPKINS, University of North Carolina.
The average for the state was 25.4 percent, rank 46th. Average for the United
States 48 per cent; for Iowa 87.8 percent.
Chances and Necessities
We have hardly even begun to capi
talize tlie livestock advantages that lie in
the soils and seasons of this state—in our
22 million wilderness acres, our sliort,
mild winters, tlie abundance of running
water everywhere, the variety of soils
that make forage crops possible the year
around, peanuts, sweet potatoes, sorghum
cane, vetch, winter grains of every sort,
and so on without limit. Poultry, for in
stance, is an almost unconsidered by
product in North Carolina, and yet we
are among the first 15 poultry producing
states of the Union. With a little atten
tion we could easily lead the whole Uni
ted States in the production of poultry and
eggs.^ And the same chance lies open to
us in the production of butterund cheese,
beef, pork, and mutton.
Our farmers need larger farm capital,
better breeds of farm animals, more lo
cal markets, stockyards, and packing
Rank Counties
1. Camdem ...
Hyde
Dare
1.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Percent
.... 47
47
45
9.
10.
10.
12.
13.
14.
14.
14.
14.
18.
18.
20.
20.
22.
22.
22.
22.
22.
22.
22.
29.
29.
29.
29.
33.
33.
33.
33.
37.
37.
37.
37.
37.
37.
43.
43.
43.
43.
43.
43.
49.
Haywood 44
Alleghany 43
Tyrrell 42
Ashe 41
Perquimans 39
Pasquotank 38
Carteret 36
Currituck 36
Gates 35
Mitchell 34
Jackson 33
Mecklenburg 33
Washington 33
Chowan 33
Olay 31
Madison 31
Gaston 30
Watauga 30
Cabarrus 29
Catawba 29
Cleveland 29
Greene 29
Johnston 29
Rowan 29
Yancey 29
Bertie 28
Graham 28
Lincoln 28
Pamlico ,28
Forsyth 27
Iredell 27
Buncombe 27
Guilford 27
Davie 26
Hertford 26
Macon 26
Northampton 26
Pitt 26
IVarren 26
Union 25
Transylvania 25
Henderson 25
Harnett ' 25
Davidson 25
Cherokee 25
Durham 24
Rank Counties
49. Duplin
49. Martin
49. Swain
Percent
53.
Vance
53.
Sampson
53.
Rutherford
53.
Nash
53.
Lenoir
53.
Halifax
53:
Franklin
53.
Yadkin
53.
Edgecombe
53.
Beaufort
53.
Stanly
53.
Alexander
65.
Chatham
65.
Craven
65.
New Hanover ...
22
65.
Surry
65.
Wake
70.
Wilkes
70.
Randolph^
70.
Scotland
70.
Orange
70.
Columbus
70.
Lee
70.
Alamance
70.
Caldwell
78.
Burke
78.
Granville’
78.
Onslow’
78.
Person
78.
Stokes
83.
Wilson
83.
Wayne
83.
Rockingham ....
19
83.
Pender
83.
Jones
88.
McDowell
88.
Moore
88.
Polk
88.
Rooeson
88.
Brunswick
93.
Anson
93.
Bladen
93.
Richmond
96.
Montgomery
96.
Caswell
98.
Cumberland ...
Avery and Hoke omitted for lack of population figures,
formed since the 1910 Census.
Both counties were
S