Jasper Republican, Volume 2, Number 4, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 October 1875 — The Farm the Place to Make Men. [ARTICLE]

The Farm the Place to Make Men.

Glancing through our list of successful business men we find that a large proportion of them received their early molding for life-work upon the farm. Onr leading professional men were brained in the common schools of the country, and there were taught habits of industry and frugality which are at the foundation of their success. ; Country boys, farmers’ sons that work upon the farm summers, attend school winters five days in the week and work at home Saturdays, may think their lot pretty hard when compared with their favored friends in the city. But, did they bat know it, this discipline of labor and self-denial gives them an appreciation of education and advantages that city boys never possess. Country boys invariably love to go to school; city boys hate the school-room; and in this very fact largely lies the cause of the ranks of successful men in til walks of life being filled by men whose early boyhood was spent in the country. Boys verging on manhood in the city feel that they have more requirements than the farmer boys. They spend more money, with no real benefits accruing from it, and the result is the formation 01* habits that act diametrically opposite to success. Four generations away from the farm generally spoils this stock, and there must be new importations direct from the country to give strength to business and professional life. Men forget to what they owe their success and in their desire to give their children the best of advantages do that which enervates rather than strengthens. They may stuff with privileges, but the man is made by having self-denial and a sprinkling of hardship enter his life. Trials beget character, and work is the parent of strength. Farmers’ sons need not deplore their lot and look with wistful eyes at the wonderful advantages and easy times of their city brothers, for a glance at statistics will show that their chances of success are many per cent, higher than those of the most favored of city boys. It is not intended to urge the countty boys to follow the vocation of their fathers if they have talent for trade or mechanics or the professions; far from it. The best advice is to let them follow their natural inclinations; but never feel because you are a farmer’s son and must needs work hard and exercise self-denial and fairly work your common-school education on that you are down-trodden and abused. These trials are your advantages and will make sterling men of you if you only make the most of your opportunities. —Detroit Free Press.