Jasper County Democrat, Volume 12, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 August 1909 — JUST A WORD TO THE FARMER [ARTICLE]

JUST A WORD TO THE FARMER

Mutual ’Phone Co. Is Principally For His Benefit. SHOULD HAVE LOYAL SUPPORT It Is His Duty to Take Stock Where Financially Able, and Help By His Voice and Time to Make the Move* ment a Success All the Way Through.—Come Out to the Meeting This Afternoon At the Court House. A meeting will be held at the court house in Rensselaer to-day, Saturday, August 7, 1909, for the purpose, of organizing a Mutual Telephone Company in Jasper county. .The movement is in the interest of the farmers almost entirely,. and is intended to give them better and cheaper telephone service. While there is much complaint in Rensselaer about the service given by the present, telephone company, the greatest complaint comes from the country districts and smaller towns of the county, where the service has long been simply rotten. If the ideas of The‘Democrat are carried out it will not be very long until we will have a telephone system in this county which will enable every farmer and resident of the smaller * towns, who has a telephone in his house, to reach the county seat at least without any extra charge whatever, and every telephone subscriber at the county seat can talk with any other subscriber in the county without and toll charges. A good, up-to-date exchange will be put in at Wheatfield, and Keener and Kankakee townships connected j up with same, and the former con- ! nected up with Rensselaer, thus affording the people of the north end excellent servibe and free from toll charges to the county seat. We believe this can be done, as above suggested, and base our opinion on information secured from | practical telephone men and the offi- ■ cers of the Brook mutual, the latter company having had three years experience in the telephone business and having transformed a very “bum” exchange and telephone service into one of the best in Indiana. Our proposed mutual telephone company, as stated at the beginning of this article, is organized principally to benefit the farmer, who in this day and age can scarcely get I along without telephone connections with his county seat town, his home village and his neighbor farmers. The telephone to him—if good service is rendered is a money and time-saver, and he cannot afford to be without it. He should therefore, lend his moral and financial assistance to help ■ this movement along and make it the success which it promises to be. There is no reason why we can not operate a mutual \as successfully as is done by our neighbors at Brook or in scores of i other sections of Indiana. So far no one in Rensselaer has been asked to subscribe for a share of stock in this proposed mutual company, and while a great many shares ' can be disposed of here, The Democrat would like to see practically all of it placed out among the farmers of the county, and we honestly believe it will yield them a good per cent on their investment as well as causing them to take a more personal Interest and pride in the telephone system which it is proposed to establish. So far the farmers are taking hold of the matter firstrate, and those who have expressed confidence in the plan and are giving it their hearty support are among the best and most substantial farmers of Jasper county. The list of subscribers on the stock subscription blank at The Democrat office represents more than half a million of dollars’ wealth.