The news in this publi
cation is releas84 for the
press on receipt.
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
NEWS LETTER
Published Weekly by the
University of North Caro
lina for the University Ex
tension Division.
DECEMBER 14, 1927
CHAPEL HILL, N. C.
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA PRESS
VOL. XIV, No. 7
ft^flitorial Itoardi
E. C. Branson, S. H. Hobbo. Jr.. P. W. Wager, L. K. Wilson. E. W. Knight, D. D. Carroll. H. W. Odu
Entered as second-class matter November 14, 1914. at the Postoffice at Chapel Hill, N. C.. under the act of August 24. 1912.
SAVINGS DEPOSITORS
Last week we presented a table which ^
ranked the states according to their
bank savings per capita. This week
we are shiwing the number of savings
depositors per 1,000 population. We
have added to the number of bank sav
ings depositors, postal savings deposit
ors, and members of building and loan
associations. . In the case of building
and loan associations the membership
for 1926 had to be used; in all other
cases the number of depositors is that
reported on or about June 30. 1926.
In the United States as a whole there
are 496 depositors in one or another of
these savings institutions for each 1,000
people. Of course those people who
have deposits in more than one institu
tion are counted more than once. Since
the average American family contains
4.3 persons the number of savings de
positors averages 2.13 per family. This
IS evidence that there is a wide diffu
sion of prosperity in the United States
and widespread habits of thrift.
Unevenly Distributed
When the states are ranked we find
that the New England and Middle At
lantic states have relatively more de
positors than the United States as a
whole. Massachusetts, the highest-
ranking state, has more depositors than
it has population. This is explained by
the fact that a person may have de
posits in two or more institutions. It is
also likely that the savings institutions
of Massachusetts have patrons living
outside the state. The same is un
doubtedly true of New York, Pennsyl
vania, Maryland, and other states con
taining large cities with strong savings
banks.
The Southern states rank low—West
Virginia, Louisiana. Virginia, and
Florida being the only Southern states
with as much as one depositor per fam
ily. Eight of tlie ten lowest-ranking
states are Southern states, the other
two being New Mexico and Idaho. New
Mexico ranks lowest of all, with onlf
64 depositors per thousand people. This
low rank is due, perhaps, to the fact
that New Mexico is a young state, still
in the frontier stage, with little surplus
capital. The general low rank of the
South can hardly be attributed solely
to lack of thrift on the part of its peo
ple. There are thousands of negroes
and thousands of white folks who may
be characterized as thriftless, but much
of the poverty in the South is found
among tenant farmers who are poor
through no fault of their own.
Poverty in N. C.
North Carolina has 199 savings de
positors for each 1,000 of its population.
This is about one depositor per family
and our families average 6.0 persons
compared with 4.3 for the United
States. Thirty-three states, including
several Southern states, make a better
showing. North Carolina boasts of
its healthful climate, its varied crops
and resources, its pure native stock,
and its magnificent opportunities. It
is represented as a land where nature
has done everything possible to make
living easy; and so it has. There are
no congested slum sections; there are
no foreign quarters; there are no hu^e
cities whose multitudes obscure the in-
«lividual; there is no severity of climate
to bring suffering. Yet there is a vast
amount of poverty and distress in the
state. Perhaps there is more real
want in the country than in the cities,
for the reason that charity is less satis
factorily organized. There are thou
sands of families in North Carolina liv
ing on the land, enjoying fresh air and
sunshine in abundance, yet living on a
bare subsistence level. In a state like
North Carolina the restoration of such
families ought to be easy, but it will
not be accomplished unless there is an
agency to approach the task scientif'
ically and continue indefinitely in its
supervision. Yet certain counties count
it economy to employ no welfare of
ficer.
The nation as a whole is rich. The
average family is saving money. The
savings available each year for invest
ment reach a huge total. There is
perhaps less poverty than ever before;
nevertheless there is too much. Peo
ple of means are generous, but in
discriminate charity never rehabilitates
a family; poor relief must be replaced
by social engineering. The increasing
complexity of life means that there are
more and more people who need direc- j
tion, and that is a job for the social ;
technician.—Paul W. Wager.
A FARM SAVINGS BANK
By following a system of selective
cutting, taking only trees of good size,
one good farmer of Moore county has
been able to cut an average of 50,000
board feet of lumber each year for 26
years from'his farm of 360 acres.
‘W. T. Brown of Spies, in Moore
county, is handling his farm woodlot as
it should be handled and is using it as
savings bank,” says R. W. Graeber,
extension forester at State College.
When be took over his father’s farm
of 360 acres some 26 years ago, be de
termined to follow his fatlter’s plan of
cutting out the mature timber each
year during the winter months. Since
most of the mature trees had been cut,
Mr. Brown was forced to mill the
smaller, second growth, but by carefully
selecting only the best trees he has cut
over 60,000 board feet of lumber each
year for the time be has had the farm
in charge. Some sections of the
woodlot have been cut over each five
years.”
Mr. Graeber states that Mr. Brown
uses the whole tree. The laps and
crippled trees are used for wood and
the better stock for lumber. With 276
acres of his land now growing timber,
Mr. Brown expects to make a timber
harvest each year during bis lifetime
and to leave more timber on the place
than when he began to cut. He har
vests the timber during the winter, us
ing his own labor and operating his mill
with a little water power on the farm.
This is one excellent example of good
timber farming, according to Mr.
Graeber. It is a method that other
landowners in North Carolina should
follow because using timber as a farm
crop gives employment to labor during
idle seasons, enables the owner to use
the whole tree and also brings in a
steady income year after year. It is a
much better method than selling all the
timber to a saw mill operator and
letting him go through the property at
one time cutting the best and wasting
the remainder.—Vass Pilot.
NEGRO SAVINGS
According to tentative estimates
based on a survey of North Carolina
building and loan associations and
Negro shareholders in such associations,
investigators, working with a local
committee of the “Durham con
ference,” find that Negro shareholders
have at least ?6,000,000 invested in the
white building and loan associations of
the state, and nearly $700,000 in Negro
associations.
The 1926 annual report of the in
surance commissioner of North Caro
lina is the source of the information
upon which the estimates are based.
According to this report there are
seven Negro building and loan asso
ciations in North Carolina, with 1,380
shareholders. The total assets of these
associations are $665,667.11, an average
per capita investment for each share
holder of $600 and over. The report
further reveals that 12,451 Negroes
are shareholders in white associations
Assuming, as a conservative basis for
their estimate, that Negro shareholders
in white associations have a per capita
investment not less than that shown in
Negro associations, the committee
estimates that the Negro shareholders
in white associations have a total in
vestment of more than $6,000,000.
The striking fact is revealed by the
survey that two Negro building and
loan associations of Durham, which
have combined assets of close to $372,
000, have well over one-third of the
total assets of all Negro associations of
the state. They have over 400 share
holders, or close to one-third the mem
bership of Negro associations in the
state. The Mutual, of Durham, is the
largest Negro association in the state,
—Durham Herald.
N. C. PAUPERS
Pauperism in North Carolina, as far
as one can judge by the reports of coun
ties on outdoor poor relief and county
TEACH THRIFT
The paramount challenge to edu
cation in America today calls for
the effective teaching of personal
econoimcs—for education in the
management of personal incomes
so that they will give every in
dividual a good living during his
productive years and provide certain
security for the non-productive
years of his old age.
Our chidren today are passing
through our educational systems
practically without instruction for
placing their lives on a sound
economic basis, virtually without
direction in the elementary prin
ciples of financial success. Econom
ics has been pitched above the
average mind. What we need
above all is an economic philosophy
gauged for the work-a-day require
ments of plain people, with instruc
tion in it started in time to help
school students get a right begin
ning in the management of their
personal affairs.
When public education teaches
students to manage their personal
affairs prudently and gives them an
understaiyJing of the value and prop
er use of money then we will at
tack economic folly at the source
and begin to save our people from
the tragedy of financial dependency.
— William E. Knox, President of
American Bankers Association.
homes for the aged and infirm, is not
decreasing, declared Roy E. Brown,
head of the division of institutions of
the state board of charities and public
welfare before the second annual meet
ing of the fourth district of welfare
workers.
Mr. Brown said that in 1921 it cost
North Carolina in cash, exclusive of
farm produce, $583,000 to care for 1,600
inmates in 93 counties. In the year
ending June 30, 1927, it cost 89 coun
ties $700,000 to care for 1,900 inmates.
Add to this an estimated total of $200,-
000 spent for outdoor poor relief in the
counties of the state? and it x is easily
seen that North Carolina counties are
spending close to a million a year for
relief of poverty.
Pointing out the necessity of careful
supervision of county homes in order
to obtain more adequate and economi
cal care, Mr. Brown revealed the fact
that out of 400 paupers in the county
homes of the Fourth district, 266 were
unable to do any kind of work and of
these 145 were in constant need of
medical attention.
The great need is for better hospital
facilities, he commented, giving the
work in Vance county as an example,
where a county hospital is providing in
an unusual way for the indigent sick
of the county, as well as giving con
stant care to six inmates.
The average per capita costs for the
counties in the fourth district were
given: Caswell, $26.74; Durham $39.64;
Franklin $28.12; Halifax $67.82; Har
nett $36.24; Johnston $13.13; Moore
$39.22; Nash $39.09; Orange $19.24;
Person $25.69; Wake $30.00; and War
ren $22.34. The average for the whole
state is $26.34. —Durham Herald.
THE ROAD TO TENANTRY
During the last year the Southern
Pacific lines in Texas and Louisiana
have been sending out through H. M.
Madison, agricultural agent, Texas and
New Orleans Railroad, Houston, a
large number of '‘i>ive-at-Home”
letters to the people in the territory
served by that railroad. The October
letter discusses the road to farm owner- i
ship versus the road to tenancy, and
contains, in part, the following:
“The other day some men were talk
ing about the rapid growth of tenantry.
One remarked that ‘the road to tenan
try was paved with bought supplies.’
“The road to tenantry is paved with
buying corn, buying bacon, buying lard,
buying molasses, buying potatoes, buy
ing pork, buying yams, buying oats, buy
ing hay, buying horse, chicken, cowand
bog feed. These buyings lead straight
to involuntary sales of mortgaged
crops; involuntary sales of cotton; in
voluntary sales of farm tools, and at
last to involuntary sales of land.
When the last involuntary sale has
been made, the farmer loads his per
sonal effects into the wagon; his wife
and children climb in, and they drive
down the lane to the gate that opens
on—tenantry. That man was right.
The road to tenantry is paved with
bought supplies.
‘Look at the other road—the road
to ownership. It is paved with home
grown crops—table supplies, feeds,
livestock. There are sales of surplus
corn, oats, eggs, livestock, bacon,
lards, fruit, vegetables and surplus
sales of almost everything that
can be grown on the farm. These
surplus sales bring surplus savings.
When enough of them have been made,
the farmer buys a car; bis wife and
children get in with him and they drive
do’^n the highway till they come to a
gate. It opens inwardly, and they
drive up to—ownership.
* ‘The road paved with bought supplies
is traveled by the one-crop farmer; he
is on the way to tenantry. The road
paved with voluntary sales of home
grown crops is traveled by theLive-At-
Home farmer; be is on the road to.
ownership. Both of these roads start
from a place called the Beginning; a
few years out, at a place called Youth,
there is a fork. Absentee landlords,
town-dwelling landowners and those
who loan money on crop mortgages are
likely to say the one-crop road is the
best. But it leads to what they want,
^tenants. Is that the road you want to
travel? The other road is open, paved
with voluntary sales of surplus crops
and leads to ownership.”—Manufac
turers Record.
CALIFORNIA COUNTIES,
A law placing all counties in Cali
fornia under a budget system was
signed by the Governor on May 12, and
goes into effect on January 1, 1928.
One provision reads as follows:
“Expenditures made, liabilities in
curred, or warrants issued in excess of
any of the budget appropriations
originally determined, or as, thereafter
revised by transfer, as herein provided,
shall not be a liability of the county,
but the official making or incurring
such expenditure shall be liable there
for personally, and upon his official
bond.”
After a budget has been approved,
transfers are not permitted, even by a
four-fifths vote or upon the petition of
every taxpayer within the county, be
tween the general classes of ‘capital
outlay’ and ‘maintenance and support.’
—Adapted from the American City.
UNSELFISH SERVICE
About thirty years ago, Stephen M.
Babcock, agricultural chemist at the
Wisconsin Experiment Station, invented
the Babcock test, which has revolu
tionized the dairy industry. The in
vention would have made him a mil
lionaire bad he cared to commercialize
it. Instead, he refused to accept a
cent, choosing rather to give it free as
his contribution to humanity.
Now another agricultural chemist at
the Wisconsin station has made even a
greater contribution to human welfare
and has chosen to follow the example
of Mr. Babcock in refusing to turn it
to pecuniary profit for himself. He is
Dr. Harry Steenbock, a slender, shy,
40-year-old scientist, who has dis
covered a way to treat ordinary foods
with ultra-violet rays so they will be a
cure for rickets.
Food manufacturers immediately be
came interested, and one concern of
fered him a royalty guarantee of $900,-
000 for only a part of the rights. Dr.
Steenbock did not accept. With two
deans of the Wisconsin institution, be
formed the Wisconsin Research Founda
tion, to which he turned over all his
rights. He never has received a penny
of the profit from his discovery and he
never will.
America likes the spirit of the two
scientists of Wisconsin’s agricultural
college. It takes moral stamina to
turn down a million dollars.—Capper’s
Farmer.
SAVINGS DEPOSITORS PER 1,000 POPULATION, 1926
In Banhs, Building and Loan Associations, and Post Offices
In the following table the states are ranked according to the number of peo.
pl^ per 1,000 population who are depositors in the savings departments of banks
and trust companies, mutual savings banks, building and loan associations, and
postal savings depositories. In the case of building and loan associations the
figures are for 1925, in all other cases for 1926. The table is based on informa
tion contained in the Statistical Abstract of the United States for 1926. In a
few states the number of building and loan members could only be approxi
mated.
In the United States as a whole there are 496 depositors in one or another
of these savings institutions for each 1,000 people. Of course some people have
piore than one savings account and are thus counted more than once.
Massachusetts leads with 1,066 depositors for each 1,000 of its population.
This would not be possible were not some people depositors in more than one
institution. Fifteen states rank above the average for the United States.
This group includes all the New England states, all the Middle Atlantic states,
Michigan, Illinois, Iowa, and California. None of the Southern states .except
West Virginia, Louisiana, Florida, and Virginia have as many as 200 savings
depositors per 1,000 population.
North Carolina ranks thirty-fourth among the states with 199 depositors
per 1,000 population, which is practically equivalent to one depositor per family.
Paul W. Wager
Department of Rural Social-Economics. University of North Carolina
Depositors
Depositors
Rank State
' per 1,000
Rank State
per 1,000
population
population
1
Massachusetts
1,066
26
Louisiana
293
2
New Jersey
932
26
Kansas
288
3
Connecticut
894
27
Florida
284
4
Vermont
893
28
Virginia
248
5
New Hampshire....
857
28
Wyoming
248
6
Maine
843
30
South Dakota
236
7
Pennsylvania
786
31
Colorado
228
8
New York
778
32
Montana
214
9
Michigan
762
33
Indiana
;.... 210
10
Illinois
739
34
North Carolina
199
11
Maryland
732
36
Kentucky
196
12
California
698
36
Arizona
144
13
Iowa
670 ^
36
North Dakota
144
14
Rhode Island
693
38
Missouri '.
132
16
Delaware
623
39
South Carolina
126
16
Utah
481
40
Georgia
122
17
Washington
479
41
Oklahoma
118
18
Wisconsin
453
42
Alabama
114
19
Nebraska
448
43
Arkansas
106
20
Ohio
428
44
Idaho
90
21
Oregon
382
46
Mississippi
79
22
Nevada
330
46
Texas
73
23
Minnesota
320
47
Tennessee
72 '
24
West Virginia
304
48
New Mexico
64