Part 52

It was an all-day program being sponsored by the Harlan Mining Institute safety organization in co-operation with the County Coal Operators Association.

Not only were mining officials present from many points but politicians as well were present, including Mrs. Herbert C. Cawood, Republican nominee for sheriff, a sister of the crowned coal queen.

BACK TO THE FARM

For those who do not have a hankering for work in the foothills and industrial centers there is today a greater incentive to go back to the farm or to stay there than ever before in the history of our country. For the young mountaineer there is the Future Farmer Association which not only trains him in soil conservation, guides him in what is best for his type of farm, or what stock he can best produce, but also holds out the spur of reward. It is a fine plan for promoting friendly rivalry and spurs the future farmer to excel his young neighbor. Each fall there is a great state fair in a leading city of each of the Blue Ridge states, where the young future farmers of America gather with their exhibits in livestock, poultry, exhibits of their own crops. There is even a revival of the prettiest baby contest so familiar to the old county fair of the long ago. However today the contest has expanded beyond mere beauty; there is a health baby contest. The grand champion rural child is given an award with much pomp, and to complete the spirit of friendly rivalry and to bring about better understanding and fellowship between country and town there is also a contest for the champion rural and city baby.

The mountain boy, because he is no longer isolated by rugged roads, meets his city cousin on common ground.

The scene has changed along the once rugged creek-bed road. In place of the saddle hung on a wall peg on the front stoop for passersby to view and perhaps envy, a new saddle once the joy and pride of the mountain lad, today there is a spare tire and there is an auto in the foreyard or in the garage, a garage which is often bigger than the little cabin itself.

The mountain farmer is being taught by skilled leaders to help himself.

Even if the mountaineer's farm is on a forty-five-degree slope there is hope for him today, thanks to the Farm Security Administration. A workable plan for soil rebuilding was the first step. To reclaim wet land the mountain man digs drainage ditches. Stone, heretofore hidden in the mountain side and unused, is now utilized for building barns and houses. On fourteen acres a man and his family, including a couple of grown sons and their families, can today raise a living and be comfortable. With a loan of $440 from the Farm Security Administration a once unproductive miserable farm can be made liveable and productive.

The farmer of the hill country is being trained to put to use the things at hand.

Second-growth timber is coming on and is conserving the productive qualities of the hillside soil which was drained away by ruthless cutting of timber a quarter century ago. Today the farmer is taught to treat his farm and pasture land with lime and phosphate, a thing unheard of in the early days. And the greatest of all his blessings today, the mountain farmer will tell you, is the good road.

Why then should he want to leave the mountains he knows and loves so well?

It was tried by the young folks, but finding themselves ill fitted for work at coal camps or steel and iron mills or factories or industrial centers, they returned eagerly to the hills, at least during the first five years of the thirties.

To this day, though some have remained in the mill towns, it is not uncommon to hear the womenfolk--whose men have provided them with modern conveniences, a frigidaire, a gas range, an electric washer and iron, a spigot of running water--say, "Wisht I had back my cellar house, my cedar churn, the battling block to make clean our garments. All these here fixy contrapshuns make slaves of my menfolks at public works to earn enough cash money to pay for them." And again, "I'm a-feared of that 'mobile. I'd druther ride behint old Nell in the jolt wagon."

Recently a Harvard sociologist, Dr. C. C. Zimmerman, has suggested that, because the Appalachian and Ozark farmers are producing children in excess of the number "required to maintain a population status quo," they pull up stakes and settle in "declining rural New England."

However, those in a position to know, through long years of close contact with the southern mountaineer and his needs, point out that no resettlement or colonizing plan can be worked out until a better program of regional analysis is first accomplished. They point out that many a mountain farmer would not earn in a whole lifetime of toil enough money to make a down payment on "even a rundown New England farm."

Besides there is still in the makeup of the mountaineer that spirit of independence. He does not want to rent. He wants to own outright, even if his property is no more than a house seat. There are few sharecroppers in the southern highlands. A mountaineer would rather suffer starvation than be subservient. Though he may be illiterate he still remembers, because the story has been handed on by word-of-mouth, the suffering and mistreatment of his forbears across the sea.

To add to his security today there is the Tenant Purchase program for rehabilitation through the United States Department of Agriculture, and mountain men themselves are selected as members of the committee. It is a part of the FSA. The Big Sandy News, July 25, 1941, carries this story to the mountaineer: "The Tenant Purchase program provides for the purchase of family type farms by qualified tenants under the Bankhead-Jones Tenant Purchase Act. Farm Security Administration rehabilitator loans are available to low income farm families, ineligible for credit elsewhere, for the purchase of livestock, workstock, seed, fertilizer and equipment, in accordance with carefully planned operation of the farm and home. About 150 farm families in Lawrence county have already been helped by this program.

"The services of debt adjustment committeemen are available to all farmers, as well as to FSA borrowers. The committeemen will assist creditors and farm debtors to reach an amicable adjustment of debts based on the ability to pay."

In this particular section of the Blue Ridge, while some are looking to the soil, others have an eye on the waters above the earth. There is being revived the plan of twenty years ago for the canalization of one of the best-known and most important rivers of the Blue Ridge Country--the Big Sandy. As a means to that end there is an organization called the Big Sandy Improvement Association and, with a mountain man, Congressman A. J. May, to espouse its cause, things look promising for the project.

The mountain men and their city co-workers get together and speak their minds and exchange views at dinner meetings down in the Big Sandy Valley. A survey is being conducted to show to what extent a navigable river would aid industry, especially the coal business. Mountain men are joining their practical knowledge with the scientific knowledge of men of the level land who are putting the plan of canalization of the Big Sandy River before Uncle Sam for consideration and backing.

The people of the Blue Ridge mountains are learning slowly and surely to mingle and to work with others. That again is due to good roads.

Once there was the simple manner of making sorghum, whereby the mountain man paid for the use of the mill in cash or cane; today there is the Sorghum Association which helps the mountaineer market his product. There is even a Blackberry Association whose trucks drive to the very door and load up every gallon a family can pick.

Conservation is evident on every side and mountain people are realizing the benefits in dollars.

Where once timbering was carried on in an appallingly wasteful manner, reforestation under the guidance of trained leaders is under way. Camps of the CCC dot the whole southern mountain region and fruits of their efforts can be seen in the growing forests on many a mountain side. In Mammoth Cave National Park alone 2,900,000 seedlings were planted to stay gulley erosion in an area of 3,000,000 square yards.

Mountain boys who have entered CCC camps are rated high in obedience, deportment, and adaptability to surroundings. Some of them have never been away from home before. Many have been no farther than the nearest county seat.

Frequently the mother back home can neither read nor write but she shows with pride a letter from her son. "My boy's in the Three C's. He's writ me this letter. Read with your own eyes." You see her glow with genuine pride of possession as you read aloud--perhaps the hundredth time she has heard it--the boy's letter. The mother shows it to everyone who crosses her threshold there in the Dug Down Mountains of Georgia. There is another letter too. "Johnny's captain writ this one." She knows them apart even though she does not know A from B. "Johnny's captain has writ moughty pretty about our boy." So well does the old mother know the content of the letters she is ready to prompt if the visitor omits so much as a single word in the reading. And when Johnny came home, after his first months of service were ended, he was hailed as a conquering hero by family and neighbors alike. The mother was proudest of all. "Look at this-here contrapshun." From the well-ordered case in the boy's trunk she brought out a toothbrush. "He's larnt to scrub his teeth with this-here bresh and"--she added with unconcealed satisfaction--"he don't dip no more. 'Pon my honor he's about wheedled me into the notion of givin' up snuff. But when a body's old and drinlin' like I'm getting to be dipping is a powerful comforting pastime."

The mountain boy's older brothers and father too have come to understand co-operation. They can work with others. They know the meaning of WPA folklore. When the boss calls out jovially, "Come and grab it, boys!" they, who have never heretofore worked by the clock, know dinner time is up and they must start back to work. When the head of the work crew calls out "Hold! Hold! Hold!" they know a fuse of dynamite is about to be lighted to blast the rock from the mountain side and they hurry to safety. "Dynamite is powerful destructuous!" one tells the other, and they remain at safe distance until again the boss of the crew calls out "All right!" and they are back with pick and shovel.

The mountaineer has become a good steel worker, a dairyman in the foothills, a good mill hand.