The Negro Farmer Part 5

May 1. 30 lbs. bacon, $3.45; (25) 30 lbs. bacon, $3.30; sack meal, $1.35 8.10

June 8. 2-3 bu. oats, 35c; 1-3 bu. corn, 25c; bu. meal, 70c; sack feed, $2.50 3.80

June 14. Sack meal, $1.35; 12 lbs. bacon, $1.32; cash, $1.00; (22) 12 lbs. bacon, $1.38 5.05

June 22. Sack meal, $1.35; sack feed, $2.50; plow sweep, 35c 4.20

July 1. 6 lbs. bacon, 69c; (5) sack feed, $2.60; half bu. meal, 35c; (9) bu. meal, 75c; 10 lbs. bacon, $1.15 5.54

July 18. 8 lbs. bacon, 92c; (19) sack feed, $2.60; (25) bu. meal, 90c 4.42

Aug. 6. Half bu. meal, 50c; 4 lbs. bacon, 46c; cash, 35c 1.31

Aug. 6. Interest 15.34

Oct. 6. Cash, 75c .75 ------- $138.70

The second family consists of three adults and three children. They have three one-roomed cabins, own one mule and two cows, and are leasing fifty acres of land, the effort to buy it having proven too much. Their account for 1900 and 1901 was as follows:

1900.

Balance Jan. 1 $ .50 Cash 9.00 Clothing 9.79 Feed 11.50 Provisions 13.48 Tobacco .80 Tools, etc. .40 Interest and recording fee 5.77 ------ $52.24

1901.

Balance Jan. 1 $ 4.15 Cash 2.82 Clothing 7.55 Feed 21.22 Provisions 17.69 Tobacco .55 Tools, etc. .70 Interest and fee 7.90 ------ $62.48

The debit for 1900 was all paid by November first and by November first, 1901, $58.40 of the charge for that year had been paid. In 1900 the man paid $94.61 towards his land but has since been leasing.

The third family consists of two adults and three children. They live in a board cabin of two rooms, have one mule, one cow and one horse. They are purchasing 50 acres of land. Their accounts for 1900 and 1901 stand between the two already given.

1900.

Balance 1899 $17.24 Cash 23.20 Clothing 4.73 Provisions 19.80 Tools 4.40 Interest and fee 8.04 ------ $77.41

1901.

Balance 1900 $13.93 Cash 21.28 Clothing 6.30 Feed 26.50 Provisions 21.36 Tools 3.50 Interest and fee 12.40 ------- $109.28

By November 30, 1901, they had paid $79.13 of their account. In 1900 they paid $180 towards their land and $29.60 in 1901.

All of these families are a little above the average. The income is supplemented by the sale of chickens, eggs and occasionally b.u.t.ter. In hard years when the crops are poor the men and older boys seek service in the mines of North Alabama or on the railroads during the summer before cotton picking begins, and again during the winter.

The outfit of the average farmer is very inexpensive and is somewhat as follows:

Harness, $1.50; pony plow, $3.00; extra point, 25c $4.75

Sweepstock (a), 75c; 3 sweeps, 90c; scooter (b), 10c 1.75

2 hoes, 80c; blacksmith (yearly average), 50c 1.30 ----- Total $7.80

(a) A sweep is a form of cultivator used in cleaning gra.s.s and weeds from the rows of cotton.

(b) A scooter or "bull-tongue" is a strip of iron used in opening the furrow for the cotton seed.

A cow costs $25, pigs $2 to $2.50, wagon (seldom owned) $45. A mule now costs from $100 to $150, but may be rented by the year for $20 or $25.

Owners claim there is no profit in letting them at this price and the Negroes a.s.sert that if one dies the owner often claims that it had been sold and proceeds to collect the value thereof. From either point of view the plan seems to meet with but little favor.

The following table will give some idea of the condition and personal property of a number of families in Lowndes County:

----------+----+----+----+----+----+---+-----+---+---+----+---+----+ A B C D E F G H I J K L ----------+----+----+----+----+----+---+-----+---+---+----+---+----+ Family 1 4 1 2 0 2 0 [9]0 0 0 2 0 2 " 2 2 1 1 0 1 0 2 0 0 2 0 1 " 3 3 3 3 0 3 1 1 0 0 2 0 1 " 4 2 3 0 1 2 0 1 1 0 1 0 1 " 5 4 2 1 1 2 0 0 2 0 1 2 1 " 6 5 1 1 0 2 0 1 2 0 2 0 0 " 7 3 0 1 1 3 0 1 0 0 2 0 1 " 8 3 1 1 1 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 " 9 4 0 0 3 5 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 " 10 5 4 1 1 3 0 1 0 0 2 0 1 ----------+----+----+----+----+----+---+-----+---+---+----+---+----+ 10 35 16 11 8 25 1 8 6 1 14 2 10 ----------+----+----+----+----+----+---+-----+---+---+----+---+----+

Key to columns:

A Adults B Children under 14 C Log Cabins D B'd Cabins E No. Rooms F Sewing Machines G Mules H Horses I Oxen J Cows K Pigs L Dogs

It will be seen that the number of oxen is small. I should not be surprised if some of the hogs escaped observation.

An account of this district would not be complete without reference to the herb doctors who do a thriving business, charging from twenty-five cents per visit up. They make all sorts of noxious compounds which are retailed as good for various ailments. The medicines are perhaps no more harmful than the patent compounds of other places. There are also witch doctors, of whom the Negroes stand in great awe and many a poor sufferer has died because it was believed that he or she was bewitched by some evil person, hence physicians could have no power.

The budgets given indicate, and this is my own belief, that the farmers in this district are just about holding their own. They are not trained to take advantage of their environment to the full so they do not prosper as they might, while occasional designing persons take great advantage of them, thereby rendering them discouraged. The introduction of a more diversified farming, the greater utilization of local resources in fruits and vegetables, thereby giving variety in the diet, the development of pastures and stock raising would enable them to break away from the mortgage system, which r.e.t.a.r.ds them in many ways.

This view that the farmers here are about able to make a living is supported by the investigations of Professor Du Bois.[10] He gives the following report of 271 families in Georgia:

Year, 1898. Price of cotton low.

Bankrupt and sold out 3 $100 or over in debt 61 $25 to $100 in debt 54 $1 to $25 in debt 47 Cleared nothing 53 Cleared $1 to $25 27 Cleared $25 to $100 21 Cleared $100 and over 5 ---- 271

Regarding the general situation he says: "A good season with good prices regularly sent a number out of debt and made them peasant proprietors; a bad season, either in weather or prices, still means the ruin of a thousand black homes." Under existing conditions the outlook does not seem to me especially hopeful.

ALLUVIAL DISTRICT.

=A DOUBLE CABIN IN THE DELTA.=

The Mississippi river, deflected westward by the hills of Tennessee, at Memphis sweeps in a long arc to the hills at Natchez. The oval between the river and the hills to the East is known as the "Delta." The land is very flat, being higher on the border of the river so that when the river overflows the entire bottom land is flooded. The waters are not restrained by a good system of levees and the danger of floods is reduced. There are similar areas in Arkansas and Louisiana and along the lower courses of the Red and other rivers, but what is said here will have special reference to Mississippi conditions. The land is extremely fertile, probably there is none better in the world, and is covered with a dense growth of fine woods, oak, ash, gum and cypress. The early settlements, as already stated, were along the navigable streams, but the great development of railroads is opening up the entire district.

The country may still be called new and thousands of acres may be purchased at a cost of less than $10 per acre, wild land, of course.

Cultivated land brings from $25 up.

Considering its possibilities the region is not yet densely populated, but a line of immigration is setting in and the indications are that the Delta will soon be the seat of the heaviest Negro population in the country. Already it rivals the black prairie of Alabama. There have been many influences to r.e.t.a.r.d immigration, the fear of fevers, malaria and typhoid, commonly a.s.sociated with low countries, and the dread of overflows. Because of the lack of the labor force to develop the country planters have been led to offer higher wages, better houses, etc. There is about the farming district an air of prosperity which is not noticeable to the East. The country is particularly adapted to cotton, the yield is heavier, about a bale to the acre if well cultivated, though the average is a little less, the staple is longer, and the price is about a cent a pound higher, than in the hills. Fertilizers are seldom used and are not carried in the stores. Some of the lands which have been longest in use have been harmed by improper tillage, but the injury may easily be repaired by intelligent management.

In the Delta the average size of the plantations is large, but the amount of land under the care of the tenant is smaller than in other sections. About 20 acres is probably the average to one work animal. The soil is heavier, requiring longer and more constant cultivation. For this land a rental of from $6 to $8 per acre is paid, while plantations will rent for a term of years at an acre. A good deal of new land is brought in cultivation by offering it rent free to a Negro for three years, the tenant agreeing to clear off the timber and bring the soil under cultivation. On some plantations no interest is charged on goods advanced by the Negro usually pays 25 per cent. for all money he borrows. The white planter has to pay at least 8 per cent and agree to sell his cotton through the factor of whom the money is obtained and pay him a commission of 2.5 per cent. for handling the cotton.

The plantation accounts of three families follow for the year 1901. They live in Washington County, Mississippi, in which the Negroes form 89 per cent. of the total population.

The first family consists of three adults and one child under 14. They own two mules, two cows, ten pigs and some chickens. They also have a wagon and the necessary farm implements.

Their expenses were enlarged, as were those of the other families, by an epidemic of smallpox.