A Stake in the Land Part 8

The writer asked whether, if a colony of one nationality is large, having a hundred or several hundred families, the resulting conditions would not make for separation and isolation. They would have intimate intercourse only with one another, would establish a church and school of their own nationality, and would even develop their own town and elect their own local government officials. The company's officers admitted that this would possibly happen; they said that the company had not yet decided how large a colony of one nationality, in the same locality or neighborhood, it would develop.

The personal opinion of one of the officials was that from fifteen to twenty-five families of one nationality in the same neighborhood would not be a source of danger because of becoming clannish and remaining un-Americanized for a generation or a number of generations. A colony of such size would not be able to maintain a church and school of its own nationality. As to the danger of inbreeding, the officials pointed out that the church rules and state laws would prohibit it, and said that, furthermore, the immigrants, having friends and acquaintances elsewhere in the country, would marry into other groups of immigrants.

LEARNING AMERICAN WAYS

The writer, while visiting the company's colonies, was struck by the fact that the settlers who said they had been in this country from eight to ten years understood and spoke very little English, seemed to be rather shy, and in general appearance lacked signs of American influence. Overalls and the tools in their hands were almost the only betraying marks of the American environment.

The investigation developed the fact that most of the settlers had lived previously in the congested "Little Polands" in Chicago, Detroit, and Milwaukee. The settlers explained that they lived there as in the old country, having their own Polish church, Polish schools, Polish banks, Polish stores, Polish books and papers, speaking Polish in their homes, in the streets, and in social gatherings. Even in the factories where they worked, their fellow workers were often Poles; sometimes even the foreman was a Pole. There was almost no opportunity for coming in contact with the American ways of life and with the country's language.

Several settlers declared that they had learned more about America and had used English more during the last two years in the northern wilderness than during the previous seven or eight years in the city of Chicago. Settling on land, they came in contact with the American land agents, other company officials, government authorities, American banks and stores, and with American neighbors at the community meetings. Here in the wilderness they first found how badly they needed English and a knowledge of American ways. A number of parents started to learn English by taking lessons from their children, who themselves were learning English in the local public schools.

The company's officials stated, in confirmation, that the Polish settlers in their colonies were growing in dignity and self-reliance, that they were a.s.suming American characteristics and an American bearing.

TWO POINTS OF VIEW

As the colonies of the company are comparatively young, it is impossible to foresee their future with certainty. So far they seem to be on a sound basis, and their success rather than their failure is to be expected. The soil is good and the settlers stick hard to their work on the land. The first colony founded seems to be over the danger line already. It is no longer under the financial control of the company, the settlers have secured loans outside, and their farms are progressing from the experimental stage to that of established security.

However, a settler expressed the following apprehension to the writer:

You see us, men and women, old and young, working here in the wilderness like beavers, clearing and digging, sc.r.a.ping and building. All are pressed hard by a strong hope of establishing a permanent home and of earning future independence. But we still live in makeshift houses, and so far only a few families are able to make a living, bare and meager, out of their clearings, diggings, and cows. The vast majority--almost all of us--have, at times, to leave the farm in care of women and children and look for work elsewhere--in Duluth, Chicago, Detroit--for the purpose of earning bread for the family on the farm. A number temporarily hire out to the company, but the latter's wages are considerably less than we get in the industrial centers.

You have heard the company's officials and seen their doings, and everything might seem to you to work smoothly for the benefit of the settlers. Is it not so? For instance, the company claims that it sells us tools at cost, but we already have found out in regard to a number of things that the company makes a fair profit on them.

Again, the company claims that it runs the demonstration farms only for our benefit, but as a matter of fact the company's aim is, as we understand it, to build up a large farm estate on the best land of the tract, and to sell us its products, seeds, breeding stock, etc.; in other words, to make money out of demonstration. One hardly can object to this, except that the company claims that it is doing business with us "at cost," which is not so.

Almost in everything, even in our home life, we depend upon the good will of the company, and so far we have not much complaint to make against it. In general, it has treated us well under the existing circ.u.mstances, but we are a little apprehensive about our future. Suppose we, as settlers, finally succeed in making good, clear our land, and build up our farms, as expected by the company and hoped by ourselves. Will we then be free and independent of the company's control? We are afraid not. We will still have to transact our financial matters through the bank in which the company is interested, sell our products through the company's agency, etc., not because any law or stipulation would require this, but solely because the company, with all its business establishments, is here among us. The company is retaining river sh.o.r.es, town sites connected with certain business privileges, and the best pieces of land, as its demonstration farms. This means that the company, with its fatherly care for us, is going to remain with us for a long time to come.

The field notes of the writer on the above statements of the settler were later shown to the company's head, who answered them as follows:

The expression "makeshift houses" is not fitting at all, for the buildings are warm and comfortable--hardwood floors, painted wall board inside. They are small, it is true. You can travel the country over, where pioneers are located, and I defy anyone to find a better-looking set of houses than those in any one of our colonies.

This man states that so far only a few families are able to make a living. In our older colonies I could show a list of cream checks which the different settlers are receiving from their cows; they will range all the way from $50 to $400 a month. This does not take into consideration the surplus live stock, potatoes, and other grains, which they sell from their farms. It is not expected that these new settlers will make money out of their crops for the first few years. It is expected that they will go away to the cities and work part of the time, while their families remain on the land. We state in our literature, as does all state literature, that the first two or three years contain hardships, and mean some working out to earn money, provided the settler comes without any funds whatever. The survey of all our settlers shows that while they have worked in the city ten to fifteen years, their entire savings have amounted to from $200 to $1,000. In the colonies, due to clearing, increased value of land, and earnings on their new farms, they have made from $500 to $1,000 a year. Surely this entails some hardship and some hard work.

The statement that some of them hired out to the company at less wages than are paid in industrial centers I'll agree was true during war times. We could not hope to compete with the wages paid in the munition factories of the East. The company does, however, pay standard wages, as high as are paid anywhere for the same cla.s.s of labor.

The statement that the company claims that it sells the necessities at cost is not correct, for the company sells nothing. We have an iron-bound practice that in no case do we enter into the store or sales business. We furnish the original house, barn, tools, live stock, with the land. After that we sell nothing. We have often stated that if we would enter into the store business or selling business, it would drive others out, and it was poor practice for the company to engage in any business outside of colonization, for it involved too much detail and was a separate business.

Colonization is a game all of itself, and if we divided our energies with other industries we could not succeed.

Some time ago a charge similar to this was made by some of the settlers, stating that the company was making profits on buildings.

We immediately offered to have any lumber company agree to put up those buildings for the same price that we did. We asked for a large number of bids, and the nearest bid was one hundred and twenty-five dollars more than the price we were charging the settlers. We did not ask them to bid on only one house, but on one hundred houses a year. The reason we have been able to construct these buildings at such a low rate is that we have our own timber.

When the price of lumber went up during war times, we did not increase our price one dollar. By building hundreds of houses each year, by eight or ten years of experiment, and keeping the same foreman and crew, we have been able to develop an efficiency that will allow us to put these buildings up at one hundred dollars less than the best bid we could get from anyone. We would gladly give up this detail work if some one else could do it, for we make no money on it and barely take care of costs and our necessary overhead.

As to furnishing cattle, we made an offer to one of the local Holstein and Guernsey a.s.sociations, asking them if they would be willing to furnish all of our settlers cows at the same price we were asking, and deliver them at the same time we were delivering them; we could not get anyone to accept our offer. We have lost money right along on our live stock--not a great deal, but a small amount. So when your informer tells you that they purchase goods from the company at a fair profit to the company, the statement is not correct, for we sell no goods to them at all except what goes with the land. In no case do we buy anything from the settlers, and in no case do we sell anything to them, except the original equipment which goes with the original purchase.

The statement that the company's purpose is to reserve large demonstration farms is laughable, for we only have two demonstration farms reserved in our entire tract of 60,000 acres.

Those two demonstration farms cover 2,500 acres. Already one demonstration farm in a colony where we sold practically all the land has been cut up into small farms and offered for general sale.

The other demonstration farm is in the vicinity of our present settlement and is not now broken up.

In our oldest colony we reserve not a foot of land there. The cheese factory which we started we turned over to the co-operative organization. The warehouse which we constructed we turned over to a Co-operative Shippers' a.s.sociation.

There is one thing that your informant is correct on, and that is that we retain the river sh.o.r.es. We have retained the riparian rights for the reason that some day we hope to turn this over to a water-power company and develop hydroelectric power for the benefit of that whole community. If these river sh.o.r.es were in the hands of different settlers, it would be impossible for a hydroelectric company ever to go in there and purchase each farm separately at a price that would enable it to develop the power.

The contradictions in the above interviews are to be explained by the settlers' misunderstanding of the company's general policy and methods.

In their eyes everything in the colony belongs to and is managed by the company, which is quite true at the beginning of the colony, and which cannot be otherwise at that time. The new settlers know little of one another, and are ignorant of the local conditions. They lack both business experience and capital. Therefore, as a rule they are not able to conduct, either individually or on a co-operative basis, commercial or industrial establishments at the start. It is therefore up to the company to see that there is a town, a hotel, a grocery store, a bank, a creamery, or cheese factory, a shipping office, etc., in the colony.

The fact that the company has interests in, and even controls, these concerns at the beginning, and that all these business branches work together, conducting their financial transactions through the same bank, has led the settlers to believe that everything is permanently owned and controlled by the company. The settlers in a new colony do not know that as soon as the success of these business organizations is secure and the settlers have been a.s.sisted to a firmer footing the company will turn the organizations over to the settlers themselves on a co-operative basis, as has already been done in the company's oldest colony. It is the company's policy, as above stated by its head, to specialize in the land colonization work only, leaving banking, commerce, and manufactures to others.

COLONY SNAPSHOTS

The writer visited and investigated two colonies of new settlers founded by the colonization company within a distance of about twenty to thirty miles from one another. The following field notes taken during interviews with the company's local officials and the settlers themselves give a general picture of the conditions of the colonies.

In the first colony, the first families settled about twelve to fifteen years ago. At that time a logging camp was operating and the country was covered with standing timber. As fast as the loggers cleared the timber the land was opened for settlement by the colonization company. Land buyers were taken into the logging camp, were given meals and sleeping quarters there, and were taken out and shown their land. About five years after the first settlers came most of the timber had been cut. The company then established the village and began settling from that point. The colony has steadily increased and at present contains about fifty families.

The settlers were Polish. About ten families came from Russia, twenty from Germany, and twenty from Austria. They left their old country on account of poverty, political oppression, and compulsory military service there. Almost all of them had been engaged in agriculture in the old country. About forty families had been employed in shops and factories in America before they succeeded in settling on land here; only about ten families came from Europe directly to the colony, of which they learned through the company's advertis.e.m.e.nts in the American-Polish newspapers and also through the letters of their friends and acquaintances.

The largest farm is 120 acres, the smallest 20 acres, and the average 80 acres. Most of the farms are still under mortgage, only a few being cleared of debt.

In the colony and its vicinity are seven schools: six with one room and one with three rooms. All teachers are native born and all teaching is in English. The settlers appreciate education. Most of the children are inclined to farming and will remain in the colony. One fourth of the adults do not speak English, one half only speak English, and one fourth speak and write English.

Only a few of the adult male settlers have second papers; about nine tenths have first papers, while the rest are totally unnaturalized. In explanation of this fact the company's president stated that it is only the older men who have not secured even their first papers.

A large proportion of the foreign settlers [he said] secure their second papers just as rapidly as they can after they locate on the land. They desire to take part in local politics; they find that they must become interested in local political affairs if they wish to have a good system of schools, roads, and gain the other advantages which both the county and town can give them. They are also interested in the state politics. All this brings the question of second papers forcibly to their minds, and in an accurate survey of the different colonies we are interested in, you will find that a large per cent of those who have been on the land five years or more have already secured their second papers. One of the difficulties which hinder them from getting their second papers sooner is the fact that they must have some one certify that he has actually known them for a period of five years. Coming as they do, strangers from another state, it is necessary that they live among us for a five-year period before such an affidavit can be secured.

I have had many of the settlers speak to me, desiring second papers, but they were forced to wait their period before they could secure them.

Most of the settlers read the Polish newspapers published in America.

Quite a number of families take books from the school libraries; among these are a few Polish books--stories and histories.

The settlers are of the Roman Catholic faith. They attend a local church. Their Catholic neighbors of other nationalities attend the same church. The priest is of the Polish nationality; he cannot speak English well. He is appointed by the bishop. The settlers would prefer to elect their priest themselves.

While the houses are of the American type, the interior arrangement of the living rooms remains that of the European Slavic peasantry--the bedcover is often fancy handiwork, the walls are profusely covered with family photographs, pictures of Polish heroes, and magazine ill.u.s.trations. However, an honored place is given to the picture of the President and the American flag. Furniture is placed against the wall around the room. The premises are kept comparatively clean and in order.

Diet is rather mixed, though the Polish meals and the Polish ways of cooking predominate. The settlers claim that their housewives are more frugal than the American housewives in their neighborhood.

There are very few intermarriages; nationality alone is considered a drawback for intermarriage between a Pole and non-Pole. In cases where the two people are of different faith, the Church is another drawback.

Family discipline, in respect to the authority of the husband as the family head, is less strict than in the old country. The settlers believe that this is due to the American influence. Here the husband has to consult his wife in every important question and the children are not so often punished.

The relations between the colonists and the national groups in the neighborhood are generally friendly and help is given mutually in cases of need. But there is very little social visiting between the groups, the difference in nationality being a bar.

The settlers secure agricultural advice from two sources--the company's adviser and the county agent. They raise wheat, rye, oats, potatoes, gra.s.ses--clover and timothy--while their main income is derived from milk production.

The products are sold to the local agents; there is no discrimination in prices. Necessities are bought in the near-by towns, prices being too high and goods not always suited to the needs of the settlers.

Money is loaned by the local banks at 7 to 8 per cent. This rate, the company stated, was on short-time, unsecured paper. The settlers, it maintained, have always been able to secure money on farm mortgages at 6 and 7 per cent.

Economically stronger families compel their children to do ch.o.r.es and work in the field outside of school time, while poorer and weaker families, especially those of more recent settlers, often let their children work even during school time.