Page Four
Worse Than We Thought
Farmers as a class seldom pay much attention to com
modity and industrial averages, except where their prod
ucts are directly concerned. Just now they all realize that
1948 income will be off—because of the tobacco cut, in
North Carolina at least —but few of them are completely
aware of the deteriorating farm economic situation.
With a2B per cent cut in tobacco acreage, farmers of
this section must plant more cotton, wheat, and corn, and
grow more meat if they are to maintain any semblance of
their present standard of living. But what do market
prices for these agricultural products promise them. Con
siderably less than a month ago!
Grains have fallen off 70 cents a bushel since Janu
ary 20, and corn has dropped 65 cents. Cotton (all
grades) has dropped an average of three and a half cents
per pound in the same 30-day period. Cottonseed meal
has dropped $17.00 a ton, and peanut oil is off 6 cents a
pound (drops of 17 per cent and 20 per cent, respectively).
Nor can any better be seen in beef and hog prices.
Steers are down from $34.00 a hundred to $29.00, and hogs
are now selling at $24.65, as compared with $34.00 a month
ago.
If this matter were just one of universal dropping
prices, the outlook would not be so dark for Tar Heel
farmers. Certainly local housewives welcome lower meat
and staple prices, but dependent on farm economy as is
our local town economy, local housewives can no longer
count on as much money with which to pay for staples —
and the situation is much worse for the farm families.
For example, while prices of farm products fell
around 20 per cent, steel from which farm implements
are made remained at exactly the same price—s4s.oo a ton
—for the last thirty days! Raw aluminum for manufacture
of roofing stayed at 15 cents a pound from January 20 to
February 20. Tin for galvanized roofing remained at ex
actly 94 cents a pound for the same period of time.
Finished products for the farmer are even worse, for
the price has risen on many implements. One large trac
tor manufacturer has just announced a straight 10 per
cent increase, and prospects are no better for trucks or
farm engines; for automotive unions have declared their
intention of seeking a wage increase in the face of declin
ing food and textile prices.
Coal and oil for curing tobacco will be higher—how
much higher will be determined by John L. Lewis and the
United Mine Workers. Lumber is actually higher than a
month ago, since the local lumber situation is so fluid that
the cold weather of the past month, when trucks could not
get into the woods, has raised its price.
For rural North Carolina, at least, the present eco
nomic situation is not merely one of readjustment, as
National industrialists and governmental officials have
alike declared. The situation calls for use of the extraor
dinary powers held by the President and the Secretary of
Agriculture.
More than that, it calls for pressure to be exerted by
our state farm organizations in order that action may be
taken before it is too late. It calls for action by Southern
congressmen to insure that the Marshall Plan utilizes suf
ficient tobacco to keep a fair price for at least that one com
modity through this period of decline.
So, in a measure, it is up to us. We can use our in
fluence now, or draw in our belts and wait for the crash.
A Letter from Philip Bunn
A letter written by Philip R. Bunn of the Hopkins
Chapel community on behalf of farmers in general and the
Hopkins Chapel people in particular is published in the
Record this week.
A good many of us have wondered at the expenditure
of several hundred thousand dollars on the magnificent
new approach to Raleigh from the east, while highway
employees have labored with inadequate equipment to
keep dirt roads passable.
We showed the letter to a farmer friend before pub
lishing it, and his comment was, “I’ve been thinking that
same thing and Phil Bunn has said for me!”
The Zebulon Record
Ferd Davis Editor
Barrie Davis Publisher
Entered as second class matter June 26, 1925, at the post office
*at Zebulon, North Carolina, under the act of March 3, 1879.
Subscription rate: $1.50 a year. Advertising rates on request
The Zebulon Record
This , That and the Other
By Mrs. Theo. B. Davis
It wasn’t a Wakelon pupil,
but an eighth grader in another
school who wrote on a test “the
planets are kept in their orbits
by tho gravitational pull of the
sun anu obstetrical forces.” And
the teacher’s resigned comment is
“Just further proof that ‘lt’s love
that makes the world go ’round.’ ”
No, I most positively did not
make that up as a Valetine motif
for this column.
One good housekeeper that I
know gets out enough glass jars
to hold the lard she makes at
hog-killing time. The jars are
sterilized and heated, then are
filled jars look after they
after which they are sealed as in
canning fruit, but no processing
of jars is done.
You’d be surprised to see how
attractive a row of these lard
filled jars look looks after they
are cooled and stored. There is
no worry over rancid lard during
hot weather, as the contents of
one jar can always be used be
fore becoming strong in flavor.
A writer in Harper’s magazine
for February is afraid we are
headed toward famine. He sug
gests as one way of averting this
the growing of acorns for food.
These are not to be the small nuts
we have been accustomed to see
ing, and which are the especial
property of pigs and squirrels;
but acorns from hybrid oak trees,
grown for their nuts instead of
Glory be! Seems like the
weather man threw everything
he had at us, but most of us
survived pretty well. The good
brown earth looks mighty good—
and as it dries out, it looks bet
ter all the time.
I got my motorcycle out and
kept it on its own two wheels for
a while. It and me stayed to
gether long enough for me to
learn several things about those
two-wheeled buzz-bombs. List
ed in the order in which I found
them out are a few things I
learned:
1. Don’t let a motorcycle fall
over unless there are three good
men to help set it back on its
wheels. Mine flopped over and
it took two days to rest up from
trying to set it up alone. I
grunted and groaned, but it took
real man power to right the thing.
2. They don’t start immediate
ly when you want them to. Fact
is, sometimes they don’t start at
all. On Hillsboro Street in Ral
eigh I held up traffic for two
blocks while I jumped up and
It isn’t often commented upon,
but retail stores here and in the
Soviet Union are an excellent ex
ample of the essential differences
between free enterprise and gov
ernment enterprise.
In Russia, for instance, there
are various “classes” of stores. A
few modern shops carry good
stocks and go in for attractive dis
plays and high standards of ser
vice. But these stores, under pres
ent policy in the workers’ para
dise, are open to only a relatively
few top level people—important
officials, high ranking officers,
artists whose work is in favor with
for timber.
Some of the new varieties are
said to be as large as golf balls
and less bitter than those we may
have nibbled on through curios
ity. They have also less tannin,
which causes the bitterness. Any
way, there is a process which re
moves all the tannin. Then we
have left oil and protein; or
that’s what the writer said. He,
said, too, that oaks will grow and
flourish where no grain can be
raised.
It would be wonderful to be
able to sit around and wait for
your crop to grow, with no cul
tivation, no worry or work. How
ever, from the tone of the ar
ticle, the harvest would be so
enormous you’d probably need to
rest the remainder of the year.
And you’d better get at your
planting right away.
Years ago when I was substi
tuting for a teacher at Wakelon
School, we had a reading lesson
from “The Courtship of Miles
Standish.” It included the part
about John Alden’s feeling mean
over having let Priscilla know he
loved her, and the line, “I have
done wrong; I have sinned,” he
said to himself in abasement.-
Wanting to be sure the class
understood what they read, I ask
ed Hugh Pippin “What is abase
ment?”
Hugh had not been paying
much attention and was surpris
ed at being called on, but he
rallied quickly and answered,
“It’s a place dug out under a
Kicking Each Other
and down on the starting pedal.
After I busted a couple of blood
vessels, I found that the switch
wasn’t turned on. My right leg
now measures a full inch larger
than my left from the exercise
it is getting.
3. They’ll kick like a mule. So
far my leg is skinned, two fill
ings in my teeth are loose, and
the leather is skinned on my Sun
day-best shoes because me and
the motorcycle tried to see who
could kick the other th e hardest.
The cycle won when it picked
me off the ground and flipped
me over the seat without half
trying.
4. Although apparently de
signed for highway travel, a mo
torcycle has a great liking for
ditches. Jack Potter was lead
ing me a merry chase last Sat
urday, and I determined to
catch him. So when he turned
around in front of Wakelon
School, I followed—part of the
way, anyhow. But I hit a bump,
skidded off the houlder, and
plowed up the ditch in front of
Stores and Ideologies
the ruling clique, foreigners with
diplomatic status, etc. The stores
which the masses of the people
can patronize are dreary and dirty,
and carry only the barest of nec
essities and few of those. The
worker has to deal in the black
market to keep alive. There isn’t,
of course, any competition be
tween stores—the state owns and
runs them all, and the customer
is always wrong.
By comparison, America has the
finest retail system in the world.
Every store is in direct competi
tion with many others. Chains
and independents, department
Friday, February 20, 1948
house for a furnace or to store
things in.”
Somehow I have an idea that
if I were today to ask owners
of basements (or cellars, if you
prefer that word) what they are,
the almost unanimous reply would
be that they are places under
houses into which water rises or
seeps or otherwise accumulates
and has to be dipped out or drain
ed out or pumped out.
If you have a basement and it
is dry, please put on display a
bit of its dust. This will make
you the envy of your less fortu
nate neighbors.
This is not good basement ter
ritory; the land being too flat
and sandy. Where I came from
it takes lots of pressure to force
water through red clay; and it
hurries downhill too fast to both
er with standing any where; so
whoever wants a cellar has only
to dig, with no necessity for con
crete walls and floors, unless
he really wants them. Down here
we use precaustions, seal-tite
mixtures and what not, but
there’ll come a time when some
one makes the tragic announce
ment, “There’s water in the base
ment#”
If you are planning to build a
house, take my advice and save
money, temper and time by
building a utility room above
ground instead of anything un
derground.
Or else, dig a deep ditch all
around your home and lay drain
age tile its entire length and most
of its depth.
the Riggsby Masseys. It took two
of us to push the motorcycle out.
5. You can trust them just
about as far as you can throw
them, because if you do trust
them, they’ll throw you! Or so
that’s what the experienced rid
ers tell me. Gordan Temple says
that a person can’t claim to be a
motorcycle rider until he’s been
thrown at least three times. Ac
cording to that requirement, Pat
Farmer doesn’t qualify. He says
he hasn’t been on one of the
things since he was tossed and
nearly trampled to death years
ago.
That is just about the sum total
of what I’ve learned. Lots of
advice has come my way from
lots of people. Most of it boils
down to something like this: Stay
off of motorcycles; you’ll live
that much longer.
But they’re really fun. There’s
not much to worry about—except
automobiles. Seems that most
drivers think it’s fun to try run
ning a two-wheeled vehicle off
(Continued on Page 5)
stores and super-markets, special
ty shops and mail-order houses,
are all out for the business. The
customer is king, and every pos
sible device is used to attract him
—courteous service, lower price,
interesting advertising, colorful
displays, and so on . Anybody
can buy wherever he pleases, and
if he doesn’t like one store he is
free to take his money down the
street. The average Russian just
wouldn’t believe the truth about
American retailing—just as, living
in his totalitarian darkness, he
wouldn’t believe what free enter
prise achieves for all the people.