Laura Ingalls Wilder, Farm Journalist

by Stephen Hines

  This, you see, supplies water works for the kitchen and bath room simply for the initial cost of putting in the pipes. In one farm home I know, where there are no springs to pipe the water from, there is a deep well and a pump just outside the kitchen door. From this a pipe runs into a tank in the kitchen and from this tank there are two pipes. One runs into the cellar and the other underground to a tank in the barnyard, which is of course much lower than the one in the kitchen.

  When water is wanted down cellar to keep the cream and butter cool a cork is pulled from the cellar pipe by means of a little chain and by simply pumping the pump out doors, cold water runs into the vat in the cellar. The water already there rises and runs out at the overflow pipe through the cellar and out at the cellar drain.

  When the stock at the barn need watering, the cork is pulled from the other pipe and the water flows from the tank in the kitchen into the tank in the yard. And always the tank in the kitchen is full of fresh, cold water, because this other water all runs through it. This is a simple, inexpensive contrivance for use on a place where there is no running water.

  It used to be that the woman on a farm was isolated and behind the times. A weekly paper was what the farmer read and he had to go to town to get that. All this is changed. Now the rural delivery brings us our daily papers and we keep up on the news of the world as well or better than though we lived in the city. The telephone gives us connection with the outside world at all times and we know what is going on in our nearest town by many a pleasant chat with our friends there.

  Circulating libraries, thanks to our state university, are scattered through the rural districts and we are eagerly taking advantage of them.

  The interurban trolly lines being built throughout our country will make it increasingly easy for us to run into town for an afternoon’s shopping or any other pleasure. These trolly lines are and more will be, operated by electricity, furnished by our swift running streams, and in a few years our country homes will be lighted by this same electric power.

  Yes indeed, things have changed in the country and we have the advantages of city life if we care to take them. Besides we have what it is impossible for the woman in the city to have. We have a whole five acres for our back yard and all out doors for our conservatory, filled not only with beautiful flowers, but with grand old trees as well, with running water and beautiful birds, with sunshine and fresh air and all wild, free, beautiful things.

  The children, instead of playing with other children in some street or alley can go make friends with the birds, on their nests in the bushes, as my little girl used to do, until the birds are so tame they will not fly at their approach. They can gather berries in the garden and nuts in the woods and grow strong and healthy, with rosy cheeks and bright eyes. This little farm home is a delightful place for friends to come for afternoon tea under the trees. There is room for a tennis court for the young people. There are skating parties in the winter and the sewing and reading clubs of the nearby towns, as well as the neighbor women, are always anxious for an invitation to hold their meetings there.

  In conclusion I must say if there are any country women who are wasting their time envying their sisters in the city—don’t do it. Such an attitude is out of date. Wake up to your opportunities. Look your place over and if you have not kept up with the modern improvements and conveniences in your home, bring yourself up to date. Then take the time saved from bringing water from the spring, setting the milk in the old way and churning by hand, to build yourself a better social life. If you don’t take a daily paper subscribe for one. They are not expensive and are well worth the price in the brightening they will give your mind and in the pleasant evenings you can have reading and discussing the news of the world. Take advantage of the circulating library. Make your little farm home noted for its hospitality and the social times you have there. Keep up with the march of progress for the time is coming when the cities will be the workshops of the world and abandoned to the workers, while the real cultured, social, and intellectual life will be in the country.

  The People in God’s Out-of-Doors

  April 15, 1911

  I love to listen to the bird songs every day

  And hear the free winds whisper in their play,

  Among the tall old trees and sweet wild flowers.

  I love to watch the little brook

  That gushes from its cool and rocky bed

  Deep in the earth. The sky is blue o’er head

  And sunbeams dance upon its tiny rivulete.

  I love the timid things

  That gather round the little watercourse,

  To listen to the frogs with voices hoarse,

  And see the squirrels leap and bound at play.

  Then, too, I love to hear

  The loud clear whistle of the pretty quail,

  To see the chipmunk flirt his saucy tail,

  Then peep from out his home within the tree.

  I love to watch the busy bees,

  To see the rabbit scurry in the brush,

  Or sit when falls the dewy evening’s hush

  And listen to the sad-voiced whippoorwill.

  From Mrs. Wilder’s Nature Songs

  The Story of Rocky Ridge Farm

  How Mother Nature in the Ozarks Rewarded Well Directed Efforts after a Fruitless Struggle on the Plains of the Dakotas. The Blessings of Living Water and a Gentle Climate

  July 22, 1911

  Editor’s Note:—Among the stories received in the course of our farm home story contest, the following came from Mr. Wilder,2 with the request that it be published, if worthy, but that it be not considered an entrant for any prize. We certainly consider it worthy—one of the most helpful and interesting— and believe all contributors to this feature will approve of our giving it good position on this page since we cannot give it a prize. The list of winners will be found on page 5.

  To appreciate fully the reason why we named our place Rocky Ridge Farm, it should have been seen at the time of the christening. To begin with it was not bottom land nor by any stretch of the imagination could it have been called second bottom. It was, and is, uncompromisingly ridge land, on the very tip top of the ridge at that, within a very few miles of the highest point in the Ozarks. And rocky—it certainly was rocky when it was named, although strangers coming to the place now, say “but why do you call it Rocky Ridge?”

  The place looked unpromising enough when we first saw it, not only one but several ridges rolling in every direction and covered with rocks and brush and timber. Perhaps it looked worse to me because I had just left the prairies of South Dakota where the land is easily farmed. I had been ordered south because those prairies had robbed me of my health3 and I was glad to leave them for they had also robbed me of nearly everything I owned, by continual crop failures. Still coming from such a smooth country the place looked so rough to me that I hesitated to buy it. But wife had taken a violent fancy to this particular piece of land, saying if she could not have it, she did not want any because it could be made into such a pretty place. It needed the eye of faith, however, to see that in time it could be made very beautiful.

  So we bought Rocky Ridge Farm and went to work. We had to put a mortgage on it of $200, and had very little except our bare hands with which to pay it off, improve the farm and make our living while we did it. It speaks well for the farm, rough and rocky as it was that my wife and myself with my broken health were able to do all this.

  A flock of hens—by the way, there is no better place in the country for raising poultry than right here—a flock of hens and the wood we cleared from the land bought our groceries and clothing. The timber on the place also made rails to fence it and furnished the materials for a large log barn.

  At the time I bought it there were on the place four acres cleared and a small log house with a fire place and no windows. These were practically all the improvements and there was not grass enough growing on the whole forty acres to keep a cow. The four acres cleared had bee
n set out to apple trees and enough trees to set twenty acres more were in nursery rows near the house. The land on which to set them was not even cleared of the timber. Luckily I had bought the place before any serious damage had been done to the fine timber around the building site, although the start had been made to cut it down.

  It was hard work and sometimes short rations at the first, but gradually the difficulties were overcome. Land was cleared and prepared, by heroic effort, in time to set out all the apple trees and in a few years the orchard came into bearing. Fields were cleared and brought to a good state of fertility. The timber around the buildings was thinned out enough so that grass would grow between the trees, and each tree would grow in good shape, which has made a beautiful park of the grounds. The rocks have been picked up and grass seed sown so that the pastures and meadows are in fine condition and support quite a little herd of cows, for grass grows remarkably well on “Rocky Ridge” when the timber is cleared away to give it a chance. This good grass and clear spring water make it an ideal dairy farm.

  Sixty acres more have been bought and paid for, which added to the original forty makes a farm of one hundred acres. There is no waste land on the farm except a wood lot which we have decided to leave permanently for the timber. Perhaps we have not made so much money as farmers in a more level country, but neither have we been obliged to spend so much for expenses and as the net profit is what counts at the end of the year, I am not afraid to compare the results for a term of years with farms of the same size in a more level country.

  Our little Rocky Ridge Farm has supplied everything necessary for a good living and given us good interest on all the money invested every year since the first two. No year has it fallen below ten per cent and one extra good year it paid 100 per cent. Besides this it has doubled in value, and $3,000 more, since it was bought.

  We are not by any means through with making improvements on Rocky Ridge Farm. There are on the place five springs of running water which never fail even in the dryest season. Some of these springs are so situated that by building a dam below them, a lake of three acres, twenty feet deep in places will be near the house. Another small lake can be made in the same way in the duck pasture and these are planned for the near future. But the first thing on the improvement program is building a cement tank as a reservoir around a spring which is higher than the buildings. Water from this tank will be piped down and supply water in the house and barn and in the poultry yards.

  When I look around the farm now and see the smooth, green, rolling meadows and pastures, the good fields of corn and wheat and oats; when I see the orchard and strawberry field like huge bouquets in the spring or full of fruit later in the season; when I see the grape vines hanging full of lucious grapes, I can hardly bring back to my mind the rough, rocky, brushy, ugly place that we first called Rocky Ridge Farm. The name given it then serves to remind us of the battles we have fought and won and gives a touch of sentiment and an added value to the place.

  In conclusion, I am going to quote from a little gift book which my wife sent out to a few friends last Christmas:

  “Just come and visit Rocky Ridge,

  Please grant us our request,

  We’ll give you all a jolly time—

  Welcome the coming; speed the parting guest.”

  My Apple Orchard

  How a “Tenderfoot” Knowing Nothing about Orcharding Learned the Business in Missouri—Quail as Insect Destroyers

  June 1, 1912

  This week the Ruralist’s front cover illustration shows a 12-year-old apple tree with Mr. Wilder, the writer of this article, standing beside it. There was gathered from this tree at one time 5 barrels of No. 1 and 3 barrels of No. 2 apples as a result of his cultural methods.—Editor

  When I bought my farm in the fall, some years ago, there were 800 apple trees on it growing in nursery rows. Two hundred had been set out the spring before, in an old wornout field, where the land was so poor it would not raise a stalk of corn over 4 feet high. This field was all the land cleared on the place; the rest of the farm was covered with oak timber.

  I have always thought it must have been a good agent who persuaded the man of whom I bought the place to mortgage it for 1,000 apple trees when the ground was not even cleared on which to set them. However he unloaded his blunder onto me and I knew nothing about an orchard; did not even know one apple from another. I did know though that apple trees, or indeed trees of any kind, could not be expected to thrive in land too poor to raise cornfodder, so whenever I made a trip to town, I brought back a load of wood ashes from the mill or a load of manure from the livery barn and put it around those trees that were already set out in the field.

  I cleared enough land that winter on which to set out the trees from the nursery, broke it the next spring and put in the trees after I had worked it as smooth as I could. The trees already set out were 25 feet apart in the rows and 32 feet between the rows so I set the others the same way. I dug the holes for the trees large and deep, making the dirt fine in the bottom and mixing some wood ashes with it.

  The trees I handled very carefully not to injure the roots and spread the roots out as nearly as possible in a natural manner, when setting the trees. Fine dirt was put over the roots at first and pressed down firmly, then the dirt was shoveled in to fill the hole. Some more wood ashes was mixed with the dirt when it was being shoveled in. I did not hill the dirt up around the tree, but left it a little cupping for conserving moisture. All trash was raked away, leaving it clean and smooth, and again I used some wood ashes, scattering them around the tree, but being careful that none touched it to injure the bark. The ashes were used altogether with the idea of fertilizing the soil and with no idea of any other benefit, but I think they may have saved my orchard.

  It is confessing to a colossal ignorance, but I found out later that I planted woolly aphis on nearly every one of my apple tree roots. At the time I thought that for some reason they were a little moldy. I read afterward in an orchard paper that the lye from wood ashes would destroy the woolly aphis and save the tree and as the use of wood ashes around the trees was kept up for several years I give them the credit for saving my trees.

  As I never allowed hunting on the farm, the quail were thick in the orchard and used to wallow and dust themselves like chickens in this fine dirt close to the tree. I wish this fact to be particularly noted in connection with the other fact that I had no borers in my trees for years.

  A near neighbor set out 2,000 trees about the same time and lost seven-eighths of them because of borers. He used every possible means to rid his trees of them except the simple one of letting the quail and other birds live in his orchard. Instead he allowed his boys to kill every bird they saw.

  My apples were sound and smooth, not wormy, which I also credit to the birds for catching insects of all kinds, as I never sprayed the trees. Within the last few years the hunters, both boys and men, have been so active that it has been impossible to save my quail and so I have had to begin the eternal round of spraying, and cutting the trees to get the borers out.

  When I set the trees I trimmed them back a good deal. While I knew nothing of the science of trimming I knew that I did not want a forked tree, so I trimmed to one stem with a few little branches left at the top. I watched the trees as they grew and trimmed away while they were very small all the branches that would interlock or rub against another branch.

  In the fall I always whitewashed the trees to keep the rabbits from gnawing the bark and if the storms washed it off I whitewashed them again. Every spring they were whitewashed in April as a sort of house-cleaning and to make the bark smooth, so it would not harbor insects, for I found that if there was a rough place that was where the eggs of insects were deposited.

  Between the trees I raised corn, potatoes and garden until the trees were 8 years old, when I seeded the land down to timothy and clover. Of course when I raised crops I fertilized them enough to make them grow and the trees always got their share. As a r
esult I get a good hay crop out of the orchard making two good crops from the land. I think that one thing that has made my orchard a success is that I took individual care of each tree. What that particular tree needed it got. Wife and I were so well acquainted with the trees that if I wished to mention one to her, I would say “that tree with the large branch to the south,” or “the tree that leans to the north,” etc. The tree that leaned was gently taught to stand straight so that the sun would not burn the bark. This was done by tying it to a stake, firmly driven into the ground on the south side of the tree and from time to time shortening the string which held it.

  The trees came into bearing at 7 years old and the apples were extra well colored and smooth skinned. I have had apple buyers and nursery men tell me that my orchard was the prettiest they ever saw, and my Ben Davis are different from any I have ever seen in being better colored and flavored and in the texture of the flesh. People even refuse to believe that they are Ben Davis, at times. My orchard is mostly Ben Davis and the rest is Missouri Pippin.

  If I were to start another orchard I would plow and cultivate the land for several seasons to prepare it for the trees. The wildness and roughness should be worked out in order to give the little trees a fair chance. Then I should plant apple seed where I wanted the trees to stand, and then bud, onto the sprout, the variety I wished to raise. In this way the tap root would not be disturbed as it is by moving the tree but would run straight down. This makes a longer-lived, stronger tree.

  Shorter Hours for Farm Women

  The Woman Who Manages the Farm Home Should Have Every Means of Saving Labor Placed at Her Disposal. Simple Conveniences within Reach of All