Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 263, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 November 1914 — FARMER DRIVES OX TEAM [ARTICLE]

FARMER DRIVES OX TEAM

Oklahoma's Champion Potato Raiser Prefers Old-Fashioned Motive / Power. Muskogee, Okla. —Scientific farming with oxen is not taught in the agricultural colleges, neither is it mentioned in the tone of press bulletins and literature sent out by the United States Department of Agriculture. Yet just this combination of “highbrow" farming with oxen has produced some remarkable results on the farm of O. K. Marks, half way between Yahola and Haskell, Okla. Marks’ star success was sweet potatoes —a big, white yam that Is marvelous for size and weight. His biggest potato weighed over twenty pounds. From one hill the plow turned up over thirty-two pounds of potatoes, one of these weighing 14 1-4 pounds, ahother 7 and still another 5, the Jast being far bigger than the average “biggest” potato. Marks absolutely refused to state what an acre of such potatoes yielded because he says it is so enormous that nobody would believe it. But he has the big potatoes mentioned and brought them here to show his banker, who immediately agreed to lend Marks all the money he needed to exploit such crops and grow more "of them. “Anybody who can raise sweet potatoes like that can get all the credit he needs,” said the banker as he gazed in amazement at these that were nearer the size of watermelons than they were any sweet potatos the banker had ever before seen. Proof that scientific methods were used in the growing these potaoes lies in ’ the fact that but one rain fell on them from the time they were planted until they matured, and that was just a few days after they were planted. The proof of the ox team cultivation are the big oxen on the Marks farm. Four years ago a five-yoke ox team drawing a great logging wagon loaded with farm supplies . plodded slowly over the paved city streets. They excited almost as much attention as a circus parade. That farming outfit going out to transform raw forest land into a farm. Marks was then referred to as a “picturesque” farmer and lots of fun was made of his outfit. -He had gone over into Arkansas and purchased his team. To-day everyone will admit that Marks and his oxen are picturesque, but they refer to him now as a “scientific farmer.” Marks merely made a dent in his forest farm the first year. He cleared and plowed just a small “patch,” then death in his family and other circumstances caused him to abandon further efforts for two years and the farm was turned over to a tenant. But- that first year Marks accomplished something that was worth while. The “patch” that he did clear and plow he worked well. In fact, he plowed it four times with a breaking plow, going a little deeper eaqh time, and after each plowing, harrowing and harrowing until a neighbor tenant farmer in astonishment said: “That man is sho’ just wearing that land out harrowing it.” That plot of ground this year was right in the middle of the potato field. “You can tell to a foot just where that real cultivation was done four years ago," said Marks, “by the size of the potatoes this year. All of the big potatoes grew in that plot. “Here is what the farming sharps had been telling us all the time. Plow deep enough so that the soil would absorb and hold enough moisture for the crop whether it rained or not. Well that deep plowing and harrowing four years ago had made a regular sponge, out of that ground. That’s why this enormous crop without rain this year. And think about such results from work done four years ago." “Farming with oxen may be “picturesque to most people these days," said Marks, “but just get a few figures. A big bull can be bought for ?50. Anybody who has ever used them knows that a bull can kill a mule when it comes to heavy logging work in the woods. Furthermore, it costs less to keep them. A bull costs SSO and a mule costs S2OO. You don’t buy pedigreed and registered bulls for logging. It’s just a bull that you want and he has a frame and weight that means power."