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I Paiie Four THE CLINTON CHRONICLE Thursday, June IS, 1953 FARMS AND FOLKS Bt j. m. eleazer Clemson Extension Information Specialist Corn Champion In the current publication of the Corn Industries Foundation I read this: ‘The nation’s individual com- growing champion for 1952 is a 13- vear-old boy. Lamai^f Ratliff, 8th- grader and 4-H club member, of Paldwin, Miss., grew 214 bushels on a measured acre, despite the driest year in the history of the South.' Young Ratliff defied the drought by irrigating, as he had in two previous years, and his 1952 record followed 187 bushels in 1951, and 179 in 1950—both sensational yields.” With increasing frequency now we sec the dawn of a better day breaking through the mists of es tablished custom in the Southeast, t For generations we have been an nually robbed of earned crop yield potentials by recurring droughts. Now folks are beginning here and; there to remedy that with supple mentary irrigation. And the re sults are pleasing, to say the least.! I tell you almost every week of something I’ve seen irrigation do. on the test plots of Clemson or the I field demonstrations over the state.' We are surely finding pur way witn! this great new crop insurance called; .irrigation. 4 We can well remember when 100 ^ bushels of corn per acre seemed; like a pipe dream. Yet in 1948: Clemson organized the South Caro-! lina Hundred Bushel Corn Club,, and to date 425 farmers have won! a membership in that- exclusive! group! And that, despite two very | dry years of late that proved disas trous to much corn. Last year we had just a few farmers who reached their prize corn with supplementary irrigation. Yet six of the eight state and dis trict winners came from those few. Yes, with the life-giving water in reserve and at your command, you can plant for big crop yields and then largely insure them. ♦ * * Harmony Community ..-JThat’s an unusual name. And it's an unus eta r -community; dow n there in Edgefield county. The National Grange and Sears- Roebuck Foundation conducted a national community improvement contest the past year. Harmony won it. And along with that dis tinction came a cash prize of $15,- C00! Back on the last day of March the folks in that community dedicated their handsome new community building. And their new church there would be a credit to any town or community. I attended the dedication. One thing was conspicuous. Dynamic young farm families were in saddle there. Not that they have pushed the old folks out. The oldsters sat| back and smilingly admired their) youngsters in action. One of the stalwarts there, H. H. Herlong, told me off his five sons had^fimshed at Clemson^ And all ‘had* settled fhere li/the - munity, farming. One o^themytt'as Master of their Grange the^past year, in which they won the above award. In the ceremony there they ac knowledged the valued work of their county agent, O. W. Lloyd, in particular, and the others who help ed in the community program were also thanked. That is the community where the famed farming Smiths and Her- longs live, and other good farmers whose names have not been mul-1 tipi led so much. True, they have a! lot of good land, some excellent land. But it is not all that way. However, it all looks good when - one of. those hustling farmers gets hold on it. A goodly portion of state and district cotton contest prizes have gone to folks in that community along through the years. So, congratulations to the Har mony community! You must livej up to your name. For without al most perfect harmony, no commun ity could do what you have. You have made it the finest place dh earth to live. And your children! do not go away. Why should they?! * * *" Tobacco Tobaco, the great cash crop of the Pee Dee, now flourishes in the fields of the Low Country On a tenth the acreage of cotton, in this state, it yields almost as many total ( dollars. I know of no crop where the findings of science are’ carried: quicker to the field. Clemson's ex periment statjbn at Florence does major research work with it, the plant breeders *sfre ^cohstantly im proving the varieties, county agents demonstrate new facts, and intelli gent fanners diligently apply them to the limited acres they put in the Golden Weed. Clemson's tobacco man, Lewis, lives and constantly moves in the area, working with the county agent and farmers in putting latest techniques to work in growing and handling the crop. Boys Are Thai Way I was impresed early with the importance of water. !- I think it was the summer of 1911 that it just about never rained. That was a tragedy in several ways.f Gardens burned up and we made practically no forage. But those were parents’ worries. Ours had to do with the creek. For it dried up until only a few stagnant holes were left, We would steal off and go “washin” in those until the chills and fever struck. Then par ents really read the law down to us. But what a dismal summer that was for us country kids until out in 1 August the cloudburst came? I’ve! told you of riding its mad current! before. From hil to hill it spread, j And down it came logs and all sorts of debris. Although we couldn’t swim, except a little dog fashion, we rode those logs time and again for long distances down that mad current. Dangerous! It’s a won der we survived to tell about it. And a lot of the wells went dry that summer too. But not ours. It got low. But you could always get a partial bucket of water from a drawing. There was a spring about a half mile on the back of the place. While working in the cotton patch right back of the house, we would go away over there for water, just to get out of work and kill time. We knew the spring was dry. Or it was when we saw it the day before. But we’d go again, with the pretense of seeing if water had returned to it. Even though it hadn’t rained a bit yet. At long last rain did come in Au gust. It was too late to help crops. And the harvest was meager. Things had to be tight that winter, and old clothes wer patched anew’. But the thrifty Dutchman, with that August water, soon had his truck patches at work again. And the old compost heap was made to grow’ larger that winter than before. For losses had to be recouped the following year. Dr. Fred E. Holcombe OPTOMETRIST Offices at 200 South Broad St. Phone 658 Office Hours 9:00 to 5:30 State Biding Her Time On Segregation Issue Columbia.—Jt is impossible to read between the lines of the U. S. Su preme Court’s order which delays decision and asks for more argument on the school segregation issue. Reaction here has been varied. Most officials were following Gover nor James F. Byrnes’ lead and re maining silent. As a former Supreme Court justice anything he said might be taken the wrong way and injure the State’s position. Dr. E. R. Crow, who heads the public school’s $54-milliQn equaliza tion program gave no hint of his re action. He said the construction and improvement projects would con tinue. 1 ‘Most talkative was Attorney Gen T. C. Callison who felt the delay might be a good sign, but admits “it is anybody’s wild guess.” The key to the five new questions posed by the court appears to be the basic one on the intent of the 14th amendment of the U. S. Constitu tion. That amendment assures that States will not abridge the fights of citizens and gives the public protec tion under the law. The court wants to know if the amendment was un derstood by the States which ratified it to mean an end to segregation. At least one high State official who is familiar with the Supreme Court’s ADVERTISEMENT FOR BIDS Bids will be received at the Of fice of Laurens County School Dis trict No. 55, 426 West Main Street, Laurens, South Carolina, at 11:00 o’clock A. M., E. S. T., on July 2, 1953, for the construction of an ad dition to the Sanders High School, Laurens, South Carolina. Plans and specifications may be inspected without charge at the office o£ the architect, W. E. Freeman, Jr., A. I. A., Architect, 226 West Washing ton Street, Greenville, South Caro lina, or the Columbia, Greenville and CharlOte Offices of the Assoc iated General Contractors of Amer ica, or may be secured upon a de posit of twenty-five dollars per set. The entire deposit on one set and half the deposit on aditional sets will be refunded upon return of plans and specifications in good condition within five days after bids are received. The Owner re serves the right to reject any or all bids. Board of Trustees, Laurens County School District No. 55. G. ‘ MT^fcCTJEN; ’ Chairman. " ic operations advances a thought whi:U develops a new line of legal theory which the U. S. Justices may be con sidering. Police Power Theory The theory embraces the States’ police power. Under that police pow er, the State would be able to de termine in the interest of peace and order whether segregation should be practiced. If that logic were followed, it would mean the segregated schools in the District of Columbia, one of the five cases now in issue, would be eliminated because the district does not have the status of a State. The struggle which the Justices apparently are having may also em brace a political question. That thought is reflected in the last ques tion posed by the court—does the court have authority to abolish seg regation in public schools gradually? If the court followed the theory on police power, it would not take a fin al step and declare school segregation flatly and finally ended. It would draw the lines clearly and leave the decision on segregation up to the States. The door would still be open to put an end to segregated public schools and possibly on other similar issues. Upheaval Likely A flat and final decision to outlaw the separate but equal philosophy would touch ofif a social upheaval which is hard to estimate. Apparent ly the court is mindful of that be cause of its thought on gradual change. , In the Supreme Court’s delibera tion of six months one thing stands out. If the court is of a mind to up hold the constitutionality of separate but equal schools, it probably would not have taken it half-ayear to de cide. At least one school district in South Carolina is not making firm plans on the basis of a favorable decision: a Charleston county education official wrote his teachers that they had been reelected to their jobs on the condi tion that the State is still operating the schools next fall. Subscribe To The Chronicle “The Paper Everybody Reeds” IT’S NEW. IT’S HERE DR. L. B. MARION NATUROPATH Res. 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