The news in this publi
cation is released for the
press on receipt.
the university of north CAROLINA
NEWS LETTER
Published Weekly by the
University of North Caro
lina for its University Ex
tension Division.
OCOTBEK 5,1921
CHAPEL HHX, N. C.
VOL. Vn, NO. 46
Editor*®^ Board i S. C. Branson, 8. H. Hobbs, Jr., L. R. Wil.son, E. W. Knight, D. D. Carroll, J. B. Bullitt, H, W. Odum. Entered as second-class matter November 14,1914, at the Postoffi.ce at Chapel Hill, N, C., under the act of August 24,1913.
A HALF BILLION IN CROPS
A half billion dollars, or more exactly
$603,229,000, is the total of crop wealth
produced in North Carolina in 1919 as
reported by the Census Bureau. Twelve
states made a better showing, and a-
mong these were three Southern states
—Texas, Oklahoma, and Georgia, in
the order named. See the table pub
lished elsewhere in this issue. These
census values were recorded in January
1920 with cotton at 14 cents a pound,
four months after cotton prices began
to slump the August before. Never
theless the total value of all crops in
North Carolina was more than four
times that in 1909.
In 1920, our farm crops declined an
other hundred millions in value, accord
ing to the Federal Crop Reporting
Board. Nevertheless the total was
more than three times that in 1909.
We lost in total crop values, but we
gained in rank, showing that though
hard hit North Carolina was holding her
own better than 42 other states. As a
matter of fact, only five states made a
better showing than North Carolina in
total crop values in 1920—Texas, Iowa,
Illinois, California, and New York, in
the order named.
Animal Products Small
It is well to remember, however, that
crops are only a part of the wealth pro
duced by farms from year to year.
OUR NEW WEALTH IN 1919
The gross primary wealth produced
in North Carolina in 1919 was a little
uuceu uy ...... J — ., more than one billion six hundred mil-
Livestock and livestock products must lion dollars in round numbers.
be counted into the total. North Caro-
and tobacco on a bread-and-meat basis
when a third of our white farmers and
two-thirds of our negro farmers are
tenants,- croppers mainly? In nine coun
ties of the state from two-thirds to
four-fifths of all the farms are culti
vated by tenants. For the most part ten
ants on little pocket-handkerchief farms
are not interested in raising food-and-
feed crops and meat animals; indeed
they do not want to be bothered as a
rule with milk cows, pigs, and poultry.
And tenancy grows on us apace like
creeping paralysis. We have 6,000 more
farm owners in North Carolina in 1920
than we had ten years ago. But we
have 10,000 more tenants. Whatever
may be the economic value of tenancy
as a farm system, the social problems
it creates are appalling.
We have not yet considered as closely
as we ought to do the trend of agri
culture in NortH Carolina the last 70
years. But there are comforting signs
of late that the thinkers and leaders of
the state are getting busy with it. We
invite attention to a detailed study of
this subject in The University News
Letter, Vol. 3 Nos 36 and 39, and Vol.
No. 21.
It is almost exactly four times the vol-
ne couiiieu uiva. kuc w™.. - j • .i.
lina ranks high in crop production, but ume of such wealth produced m the
low in livestock production. For in- state in 1916. See the North Carolina Club
stance twenty-four states produced Year-Book, Wealth and Welfare in
larger’ total values than North Carolina ' North Carolina, pages 25-28.
in 1919 in dairy products, chickens and j It is almost exactly half the taxable
eggs, wool and mohair, honey and wax. wealth of the state in 1920, as shown
In 1909 twenty-two states stood ahead in the revaluation figures of the State
of us in the value of livestock sold or Tax Commission. Which is to say, in
slaughtered, and in 1915, thirty-seven | a single year we created one-half as
states made a better showing in this much wealth as we were willing to put
particular 1 books after two hundred
North Carolina has made great gains ' and fifty years of history,
in work-animals during the last half cen-1 The primary wealth created m North
tury and also in the quality of meat ’ Carolina in 1919 averaged six hundred
and’milk animals-dairy cows, swine, : and twenty-one dollars per person,
poultry and the like. But in 1910 we ^ counting men, women, and children of
had only twenty-four percent or less both race's. It was an average of more
than a fourth of the livestock we need-; than three thousand dollars per family,
ed in order to be even a lightly stocked ; Counting out the cost of materials
farm area. Our meat and milk animals : used in manufacture and the value of
need to be multiplied by six or seven in ' crops consumed by livestock, there is
our cotton and tobacco counties, and by still left a total of more than one bil-
at least five the state over, if ever > lion dollars of what can be called brand
our farming is to have abread-and-meat j new wealth produced in North Carolina
basis. For these detailed studies, see j in 1919-the year covered by the 1920
census.
At this reduced figure our wealth-
producing power averaged right around
four hundred dollars per inhabitant, or
two thousand dollars per family.
We speak of this wealth as primary,
because it is (1) crude wealth produced
by the farmers, foresters, miners,
quarrymen, and fishers of the state, and
(2) crude wealth put by our mills, fac
tories and foundries into finished form
for final consumption.
And the values put upon this wealth
in the federal reports are farm and
factory values ruling in December 1919,
a full four months after the slump in
cotton prices. These huge totals are
not the prices paid by final consumers.
They do not cover price increases due
to transportation and the services of
tradespeople of all sorts. They cover
the farm and factory values of eco
nomic commodities produced in North
Carolina. They do not cover the values
of economic services. These totals are
therefore minimum figures. They rep
resent primary not secondary wealth,
else the totals would need to be doub
led at the very least.
For the most part they are authori
tative figures. Indeed they are all
authoritative except the value of live
stock sold and slaughtered, the com
mercial output of our fisheries, and the
value of our farm woodlot products.
These particular figures are yet to
come from the federal authorities at
Washington. For the time being we
are giving conservative estimates.
Farm woodlot products, for instance,
mean firewood, posts, sills, naval stores
and the like. We put this total at
twenty-two million dollars. It is not
excessive, because the firewood cut a-
lone has already been reported for the
state at nineteen million dollars in
1919.
Holding Down Our Wealth
We say gross values rather than net
values, because nobody knows the cost
of producing this wealth, or what the
net income of the state was in 1919.
It was small in agriculture; m our
the University News Letter, Volume II
No. 20, and Vol. V Nos. 18 and 19.
Too much of our annual farm income
is derived from the sale of crops, and
too little of it from the sale of animals
and animal prodncts. We market too
much of our farm wealth on four wheels.
We need to market far more of it on
four legs.
Farm wealth production means crop
values plus livestock values. And if
livestock values be added to crop
values, at least six other states of the
Union produced a greater total of farm
wealth than North Carolina in 1919.
These states are: Indiana, Wisconsin,
New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan,
and Kentucky. In all these states from
two-thirds to three-fourths of the an
nual farm income is derived from the
sale of livestock and livestock products.
And these bread-and-meat states are
the states that rank highest in accum
ulated, farm wealth.
Too Little Food and Feed
We have gained in cotton production
more than 2,000 percent since 1850, and
more than 2,600 percent in tobacco pro
duction during the same period, but we
have fewer hogs, fewer sheep, and
fewer cattle other than milk cows, than
we had seventy years ago. We have
made immense gains in corn and wheat
production but we are not yet self-sus
taining even in these crops. When
compared with the population t(^be fed
in North Carolina, we have sufliered
during the last seventy years a decrease
of 50 percent in milk cows, 70 percent
in other cattle, 69 percent in swine, and
92 percent in sheep. In other words
we have moved rapidly into the pro
duction of cotton and tobacco as ready
cash crops, and we have based the pro
duction of these crops on a farm-ten
ancy, supply-merchant, crop-lien sys
tem. It is a system that produces great
wealth, but it is also a system that
makes it well-nigh impossible to retain
the wealth in the areas that produce
it, no matter what the price levels are.
The Ills of Farm Tenancy
And the look ahead is not encoura
ging. How can we ever produce cotton
THE HOME TOWN
We live in this town because we
believe in it. We believe in it be
cause it is a good town, regardless
of its few defects, and its people
are the peers of those to be found
anywhere.
This town may not have the wealth
of some more favored communities,
but it has character, and character
is a possession which can not be pur
chased with gold.
If you believe in your home town
you will like it, and if you like it no
effort toward its improvement will
be too great for you.
Again we ask you to have faith in
your own powers; to also have faith
in your own town.
When you feel like criticising it,
check the thought before it is
spoken. You can always find some
thing good to say instead, and even
then the half of the truth will never
be told.
It is a good town now, but faith,
loyalty and united action, will make
it a better one.
Our faith in this town, brother, is
simply faith in you, because the town
is a collection of yours.
Surely your faith is not less than
ours.
Let us unite—let us act—for a
more cohesive community.
It is your home—and ours.—The
Scottish Chief.
cotton and tobacco areas, it was un
doubtedly small or nothing at all or
worse. It was larger in our tobacco
counties, because tobacco prices held
up somewhat longer and better than
cotton prices.
On the other hand, net profits in the
manufacturing industries of the state
can be figured down almost to the last
decimal, because cost-accounting is the
rule in manufacture. In agriculture,
it is everywhere the rare exception.
The sad fact is that the farmers of the
United States are not yet trained in
business methods, as the Danish farm
ers are.
The mired wheel in the economic life
of North Carolina is its agriculture,
and it imperils every other business in
the state as we are at last coming to
see. But we are still far from con
sidering the economic and social con
sequences of farm tenancy, the exces
sive cost of farm credit, the rapid de
scent of the state into small-scale farm
ing, our deficiency in meat and milk
animals, the decreasing per capita pro
duction of farm workers in contrast
with the marvelous increase in per-acre
and cash-crop totals, the sparse popu
lation in our farm areas, the lack of
economic and social integration, organ
ization ana cooperation among our farm
dwellers. And so on and on.
As a result we are great in farm-
wealth creation. We are as weak as
water in farm-wealth retention.
The Farmer’s Share
Nevertheless, a vast volume of agri
cultural wealth is produced in North
Carolina from year to year. And some
body gets it. The great problem is to
move on into a system that will allow
a righteous portion of it to stick to the
palms that sweat it out. The farmer’s
share of the consumer’s dollar is a pic
ayune, and it is not likely ever to be
larger until our farmers cooperate in
business ways for business advantage
as the California farmers have done.
The gross primary wealth of all sorts
produced in North Carolina year by
year must now be reckoned in billions,
and these billions rank us among the
first fifteen states of the Union. We
are speaking of industrial wealth, farm
and forest wealth of all sorts, and the
output of our mines, quarries, and fish
eries.
When the final state figures for man
ufacture are received we shall be rank
ing North Carolina among the industrial
states just as we are today ranking
North Carolina among the agricultural
states of the Union.
The summary in detail of the new
wealth created in North Carolina in
1919 is as follows:
Our New Wealth in 1919
Manufactured products, 1920 census
§943,810,000.
Farm crops, 1920 Census $603,230,000.
Livestock products—dairy products,
chickens 'and eggs, wool and mohair,
honey and wax, 1920 Census, $35,860,
000.
Livestock sold and slaughtered, esti
mated, $40,000,000.
Mines and quarries, 1920 Census,
$2,745,000.
Fisheries, estimated, $3,000,000.
Farm woodlot products, estimated,
$22,000,000.
Forest products—lumber, laths, and
shingles, 1920 Census, $50,000,000.
Total $1,600,645,000.
BUSINESS IN CAROLINA
As the Greensboro News said in an
editorial the other day, ‘ ‘A lot of peo
ple in North Carolina made money last
year, depression or no depression. ” Of
course they did, and there was more
money made in North Carolina than in
any other Southern state, if we are to
judge from the fact that the Tar Heels
paid over $50,000,000 more in federal
taxes than the people of any other
Southern state paid. And yet it is
doubtful if there ever was more grum
bling over hard times than was done in
1920, and is still being done. But it was
natural that there should be grumbling,
for the farmers were let down mighty
hard. From soaring prices in 1919 and
the first part of 1920, cotton and tobacco
dropped to less than the cost df produc
tion. So it would have been strange
had contentment prevailed.
Our Greensboro contemporary says
that one reason why North Carolina
leads the South in paying federal taxes
is because of the immense tobacco in
terests. Yet, besides the tobacco taxes,
North Carolina’s “profits and income
taxes reached nearly $40,000,000, and
were more than the total federal taxes
(including tobacco) paid by any other
Southern state with three exceptions—
Texas, Virginia and Kentucky.”
In view of this big tax-paying pror
gram by the people of our state, the
News says aptly: “Folks are still doing
business in North Carolina—doing such
enormous business, in fact, that they
are having to pay $40,000,000 a year
taxes on profits and income. In any
state where there is that much trading,
there is plenty of business to be had.
The only question is how to dig it out.
True, it no longer comes to the business
man uninvited. He has to get up and
dust to get it. But it’s here; and if he
has enough energy, persistence, and
ability he can find it.” That’s straight
talk, and, if followed, the vexed prob
lem of business stagnation and unset
tled conditions would be largely solved.
We believe that the farmers are going
to make a good start at solving it this
year by entering heart and soul into
the CO -operative farm marketing plan.
We believe that the merchants could
solve the problem and dig out business
if they be content with a small margin
of profit, which would bring a bigger
volume of business.
Yes, folks are still doing business in
North Carolina, and the prospect is
that with the fall months they will do
bigger and better business than they
have done for many months.—Fayette
ville Observer.
THE TOWN AND COUNTY
CONFERENCE
The Town and County Conference at
the University is'beginning its sessions
just as we go to the printers with the
copy for this issue. It is the first of
the National Regional Conferences on
Town and County Administration.
Other such conferences will be held in
various hopeful centers in the United
States during the fall and winter.
President Harding’s greeting to the
Chapel Hill Conference was given a
center place on the front page of the
New York World the other day.
Numbers considered, the conference
at the University is a small conference.
All told, the delegates from North
Carolina and other states will be fewer
than a hundred. But it is a hand-picked
group of alert, capable, aspiring
public officials, serving the state and
the municipalities and county govern
ments of North Carolina.
They are here conferring with the
experts of the National Municipal
League and its Committee on County
Government. 'They are discussing the
serious problems of Town and County
Administration in three round-tables
daily. They are the little leaven that
\ye dare to say will sooner or later
leaven the whole lump in North Caro
lina.
A Conference Bulletin
The next issue of the News Letter,
and perhaps several issues, will be
passing on to the people of the state
the important matters considered by
this conference. The opening addres
ses by Dr. E. C. Brooks, the State
Superintendent of Public Instruction,
and Honorable Authur N. Pierson, the
tax expert of New Jersey, were de
voted to the business end of local gov
ernments.
If anybody does not happen to be
lieve that inefficient county govern
ment in North Carolina is a menace to
public enterprise, then he ought - to
hear Dr. Brooks on this subject. His
address ought to make the plain folks
rise up in mutiny aginst the clumsy
business of courthouse offices. Our
county officials are honest as a rule,
but also as a rule they are unbusiness
like, inefficient, and wasteful almost be
yond belief. Not so in perhaps a score
of counties, but certainly so in the rest.
Government nowhere rises above the
level of its bookkeeping, and the book
keeping level of eighty-odd counties in
North Carolina calls for instant atten
tion.
In later issues we shall be passing on
to the public Dr. Brooks’s address in
full, and also the addresses of Mr.
Pierson, Dr. Dodds, and our State
Auditor Hon. Baxter Durham, along
with those of the officials of our local
governments at home. These men rep
resent the most capable thinkers we
have in this field of government in
North Carolina.
Or better perhaps, the University
will be hurrying to the people of the
state a special conference bulletin
carrying the addresses and discussions
in full. If you want this bulletin free
of charge, write at once to Dr. H. W.
Odum, Chapel Hill, N. C.
FARM CROPS IN THE UNITED STATES
For the year 1919. According to the Fourteenth Census. Figures are given
to the nearest thousand.
Crop values for North Carolina in 1909 were $131,072,000. In 1919 they
$503,229,000, or nearly four times as much. Our rank in 1919 was 12th.
In 1920, the hypothetical value of all crops in North Carolina was placed at
$412,374,000 by the Bureau of Crop Estimates of the Federal Agricultural De
partment. The value was less than in 1919 by nearly a hundred million dollars,
but our rank was 6th. Only five states made a better showing, namely, Texas,
Iowa, Illinois, California, and New York, in the order named.
Department of Rural Social Science, University of North Carolina.
Rank State
Crop Values
Rank
State
Crop values
1
Texas
.. $1,071,527,000
25
North Dakata ,...
...$301,783,000
2
Iowa
890,391,000
26
Virginia
..292,842,000
3
Illinois
864,738,000
27
W ashington
... 227,212,000
4
Ohio
607,038,000
28
Louisiana
....206,183,000
5
Kansas
588,923,000
29
Colorado
...181,065,000
6
California
587, §01,000
■ 30
Oregon
...131,885,000
7
Missouri
.... 569,048,000
31
Idaho
....126,492,000
8
Oklahoma
649,249,000
32
Maryland
... 109,811,000
9
Georgia
640,614,000
33
Maine
...100,162,000
10
Nebraska
519,730,000
. 34
West Virginia
96,637,000
11
Minnesota
506,029,000
35
New Jersey
.... 87,464,000
12
North Carolina..
... 503,229,000
36
Florida
....80,267,000
13
Indiana
.. . .497,230,000
37
Montana
69,975,000
14
Wisconsin
... .445,348,000
38
Utah
58,067,000
15
South Carolina...
437,122,000
39
Massachusetts....
63,701,000
16
New York
417,047,000
40
Vermont
.,.. 48,000,000
17
Pennsylvania ...
.410,934,000
41
Connecticut
44,492,000
18
Michigan
404,016,000
42
Arizona
42,481,000
19
Kentucky
348,655,000
43
New Mexico
40,620,000
20
Arkansas ,
...... 341,565,000
/ 44
Wyoming
30,271,000
21
Mississippi
336,207,000
46
New Hampshire..
.... 23,510,000
22
Tennessee
318,286,000
46
Delaware
23,059,000
23
South Dakota...
311,007,000
47
Nevada
13,980,000
24
Alabama
304,349,000
48
Rhode Island
5,340,000
1,