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The Barnwell People-Sentinel, Barnwell, S. C~ Thursday, July 23. 1936 NEW DROUTH MAY RIVAL THAT OF ’34 Rainfall Far Short of Former Dry Periods; Dakotas Hardest Hit; Federal Government Acts to Prevent Disaster. o By WILLIAM C. UTLEY NCE Again the plains of the West are thirsting in a major drouth that may surpass in destruction, desolation and de spair even the record drouth of the spring of 1934. Rainfall has been far less in some states this spring than in 1934, al though this year there has been an absence of the sweltering heat, which accompanied the earlier drouth. Worst conditions have been in the western part of the Dakotas, eastern Montana and Wyoming; in a somewhat smaller area where the corners of Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico and. Oklahoma meet; another area of about the same size in southeastern Missouri, and over a vast region of the Southeast,^ including generous slices of Ala bama, Tennessee, Georgia, the Caro- linas, Kentucky, Virginia and Penn sylvania. Over the remainder of the states between the Alleghenies and the Rockies, except for some areas about the Great Lakes and in New England, poor pasture conditions exist. The result has been to throw thou sands of farm families or. the re lief rolls; to cause more thousands to move out of the drouth regions into other states; to drive prices of food higher and higher, with dollar wheat once more returned to Chicago and other markets, and to spur the federal government to swift opefation of remedial agen cies. Drouth Talk Displaces Politics There is little talk of anything else but the drouth in th_ stricken plains; the speculation as to the chances of rain overshadow even the argumentative possibilities of politics in one erf the most colorful and interesting political campaigns of the nation's history. The ba rometer and the thermometers are under even closer scrutiny than pri mary returns and stray votes. Prayers for rain by the farmers of the Northwest have been largely in vain, with clear, unclouded skies still looking down over the parched grazing lands. Crops are suffering from the effects of the dust blown upon them, while live stock are hungry from lack of feed, which has been likewise damaged by the silt. Tk*r» km* hem tnmm hill* rmim in ikm S*Mitkm**l, mtirnl kmmry rmimuarmi ihm Imtl u*ek m Jmmm im Tmum* trmrm to to- («r« ikmt 2k prrutmt worm rfrotrwerf im ' lA# rfoarf wkwk frui/irrf ffoteai •' i knmot worm turpi mm my •fans lA* kmmkt : •I Htt >—rfj rrmmk momr Smm tminmto Ik* Somikumti bmrfti*^ Uttlr from diaki prmpnotiom durtmg Umy The Dakotas probably have been the hardest hit. The governors ot both states, as well as Senator Nye ' of North Dakota, regarded their sit uatton as serious enough to warrant their making a personal visit upon the President of the United Slates, to make a plea for money to feed live stock and bring relief to die- 1 tressed farming people. The gov- ! ernment has undertaken to render I what assistance it can; cattle will be moved out of the drouth lands into better pasture, but there will be no wholesale slaughter as there was last year. During the month of June some of the Dakota gra/mg land in the worst areas received Hopkins and the WPA revealed that hundreds of family heads would have to be transferred to the relief rolls immediately. Their cattle had been sold and in most cases they had already piled up what Mr. Hop kins called “mountains of-debt.” Reporting about results of the dry spring of 1934 and other drouth pe riods, Hopkins said during the six months before last December 15, more than 32,000 persons had been forced to leave their homes in the “dust bowl” and migrate to Cali fornia. Third Drouth in Six Years “Most of the Great Plains area faces its third major drouth in six years,” said Hopkins. Some of the regions, particularly those in the central and western Dakotas, have eonsertation program. This does not r«- fer to thm entire substitute AAA program, but only to that part of it which actual ly is soil conservation proper. This means the work and the educational program undertaken by the soil erosion service of the Department of Agriculture. Attempts are being made to re- 1 | store vegetation on thousands of acres of plowed fields, on the theory that such vegetation will combat erosion and conserve moisture. Nine contour furrowing demonstration stations have been set up in the West. This furrowing consists of the development of small terraces with closed ends. These are sup posed to conserve the rain. In many regions the CCC is assist ing the soil conservation service in the undertaking. It is believed that if the farmers can be taught to put vegetation on part of their land and to furrow correctly, the campaign will be successful in eliminating most drouth disasters. To make possible the storage of water for use in times of drouth, the reclamation service of the Depart ment of the Interior has under way a series of dam and irrigation proj ects in the western states. Some lesser projects of this nature have been on the WPA schedule. These projects are of ambitious scope and wide range. At the top Wbat 1934 Drouth Did to Owe# Ri«h Grating Lands. had low crop yields since 1930. In practically all of the areas, the severe drouth of 1934 intensified the distressing rural economic condi tions which have been accumulating over a period of years. •'The extent of wind erosion and crop damages has varied widely in different sections of the stricken area; a few sections, favored with normal rainfall over a long period, have escaped soil and crop ravages altogether. This is true of sections of the Red River valley in North Dakota, part of southeastern bo.:; Dakota and to some extent south eastern Nebraska.** Im mtker regtmm*. mwk as thm Tetm* plmini, k* said, mtmd ermtt dmmmaed ms murk •• Si per real State of tkm land t« dmm« I ta wi km* ttf fi|# r* d 9*» ii wdl 32 about •ru he* an inch is norrr if; ill where il. Cost Is 1239.99 From April 1 to June 24 during the “big dry” of 1936. North Dakota had only 2 09 inches of rainfall; during even the record drouth of 1934 these three months saw 3 83 kmdlr tkml il n doubtful wkrih-t eter be mble to mppurt crop* in the fu ture Hopkm* declared tkml MI9* k of ike crop land uv tmndy lomos mremt should be comi*rted into permanent grass land. Drastic reductions in the herds of cattle in some of the states have resulted from reduction of pasture land by three-fourths. In the Da kotas, Minnesota. Montana and Wyoming, officials estimated that Masks like these were not uncommon in the Southwest during the dust storms which followed the long dry spell of 1935. inches of rain. South Dakota fared some better, getting 4.31 inches, as compared to 4.54 in 1934. In Mon tana 3.17 inches of rain fell, as com pared with 4.15 in 1934. Texas’ rain fall during the spring months was only 7 per cent of normal. By July l this year's drouth, it was estimated, had cost a damage of 250 mil lion dollars. In the Northwest alone, 100,- 000 farm families were forced to seek subsistence aid from the government. In Washington a drouth emer gency committee was set up under J. W. Tapp, to make arrangements for the purchase and processing of a million head of cattle, which would perish if the drouth ued, although it was predicted that there would be some rain within a few days. A survey of conditions in the drouth area, compiled by Harry L. 100,000 families would have to be added to the relief rolls. It was planned to carry the work relief pro gram until December 1 and as far beyond that date as the weather would permit, at an average wage of $44 a month. ^ Compensation for use of farmers’ teams would bring the average to about $60 a month. Three Government Programs. Officials of the federal govern ment say to the farmers that the Great Plains can be prevented from becoming a desert if proper precau tions are taken. Science has not yet devised a way to make it rain, but the government now has under way a program of three divisions to pro vide for the storage of what mois ture exists and to prevent soil ero sion. First of the throe divisions is the soi/ 1910-B is available for sizes 2, 4, 6, and 8. Size d requires 1 1-2 yards of 35 inch material plus 7-8 yard for the panties. Send fif teen cents in coins. Send your order to The Sewing Circle Pattern Dept., 367 W. Ad ams St., Chicago, 111. ® Bell Syndicate.—WXU Service. Tall Fellow The tallest man in history, ac cording to the record of all au thenticated cases, lives today in Bushire, Iran. Although only 20 years of age and still growing, this Persian giant is ten feet six inches in height and weighs 450 pounds. Incidentally, he is so weak that he cannot walk or hold up his head for more than a few minutes at a time. — Collier’s The clever cutting of this use ful pinafore is shown in the small diagram beside the little girl. You will see at ,once that this frock requires no seaming and of course the feature which so greatly intrigues children is the butterfly which forms the pocket. Notice how simple it is to put on, merely slipped over the head and tied at each Side. Mothers find it a great help because it can be used as an apron over a frock, which must be kept clean, or worn instead of a frock. The panties to match are an asset— they have the comfortable French yoke top and stay snug I but never bind. This attractive design made in cotton, percale, gingham, calico, or lawn would be effective with contrasting bind-1 mg and colorful embroidery on the butterfly pocket. Barbara Bell Pattern No. of the list are such enormous an<^ expensive ones ss the giant Fort Peck and Grand Coulee dams, and at the bottom are numerous small > streams which have been dammed ot comparatively lower costa. aL j though their roots have been at-J tacked from time to time in many i cases as wasteful “boondoggling.** j Officials believe that eventually water from the reservoirs behind 1 the large dams will make possible ■ the use of much land that is now unproductive, and that the smaller dams will help in relieving the situ- 1 stion generally. Resettlement Program. In a third division of the program, , the resettlement administration, un der Professor Tugwell. haa under wrfy a SIO.OuO 000 schedule of pur- isse of submarginal lands to con vert them into pasture in combat- mg drouths. Under this plan, it is ' proposed to buy l,282.52i acres of the submarginal land at $2 an acre; it has already made rome little progress. The program is divided into two parts, one of which in- 1 volves six projects in the Plains i states, embracing 415.009 acres. The other part includes the pur chase of 867,522 acres of Indian grazing land on the Rio Grande watershed of New Mexico. The conception of the resettlement pro gram includes the mot ing of b50 families to belter land at a cost of fJJOO.OOO— that's S~>.0?h a family. It also comprises $2,645,000 for the purchase of land, and $.100,000 for antierosion work and the deivlopment of plains land. There was a fourth division of the federal government's battle against the drouth menace, the $75,000,000 shelter-belt program, but this pro gram has been dropped, due largely to opposition which labeled it im practical. Approximately $3,000,- 000 had already been spent. The idea was to#plant a belt of trees 100 miles wide and more than 1,000 miles long, stretching from the Canadian border across the Great Plains to Texas. Its pro ponents contended that such a shel ter belt would break the erosion- causing winds and conserve some of the moisture. The weather - bureau says that it would have no effect on rainfall itself. However, congress refused to appropriate the funds needed for the project, and Comp troller General McCarl, recently re tired, ruled that the President could not use $15,000,000 of drouth relief funds for the purpose. McCarl did, under protest, permit the use of a smaller sum. Some shelter-belt strips, along a 1,300 mile line, have been planted. Such a strip consists of a narrow row of trees up to a half mile long C Western Newspaper Union. CHARLIE MAKES HIS BID' f MURRY UP. # ^ TRY *0*5 WON'T lire rr * v* reef HIM WAITING ! YOU KNOW HE WANTS . . TO TALK ABOUT V TWAT RAISE 3 ASKED Fo« I % V • r AW-YlU. HER To ourr PAINTING HER PACE/ VOU'RE GOING TO A pVX’L; X •NOT A WAR, r ■HELEN.! WISH , YOU'D TOP THAT EVERLASTING I humming ! il QUIT THI* SlUV GAME, I ANYHOW/ THAT* THE STUFF/ THROW DOWN YouK CARDS —THAT always Breaks UP THE .GAME / j AU WE'LL GO N the study while Ytxj OPUS Fire something ■.TD EAT/ Winds Cause Uniform Climate Winds, when not opposed by mountain barriers, tend to cause uniformity of climate, over exten sive areas. They largely deter mine rainfall, therefore controlling distribution of life. A&OVT THAT RAISE, CHARLIE — I’M AFRAID YOU'RE NOT READY FOR. IT YET—I DON'T Believe sou realize HOW CROSS AND IRRITABLE YOU'VE BECOME / ' SAV-YOU'D BE IRRITABLE,TOO, IF YOU HAD MV HEADACHES AND indigestion / , Starting *r> . CRITICIZE, IS HE? DON’T STAND FOR IT-TELL THIS TIGHT-FISTED SLAVE DRIVER WHERE To GET OFF / -Sounds like . COFFEE-NERVES/ t HAD 'EM, UNTIL MY DOCTOR MADE ME SWITCH TO PoSTUM—WHY DON'T YOU TRY POSTUM, AND SEE ME LATER ABOUT THAT RAISE? WELL, MAYBE l WILL / I CAN'T FEEL ANY WORSE/ 'CURSES/ i'll have to SCRAM/ PoSTUM ALWAYS DRJV/ES ME OUT/ Op COURSE, children should never drink coffee. And many grown-ups, too, find that the caf- fein in coffee disagrees with them. If you are bothered by headaches or indigestion or can’t sleep soundly., .try Postum for 30days. ( Postum contains no caffein. It is simply whole wheat and bran, roasted and slightly sweetened. Try Postum. You may miss coffee at first, but after 30 days you’ll love Postum for its own rich, satisfying flavor. It is easy to make, delicious, economical, and may prove s real help. A product of General Foods. FREE — Let us send you your fint week’s supply of Postum/ree/ Simply mall coupon. O e. r. cone. Qknkbal Poods, Bottle Creek. Mich. w. n. •_ Send me, without obligetioo. e week's supply of 1 City_ .. . „, — . State Fit* In oomplmtaly, print name and add rams. iplrtaly, If you live in Canada, address: General Poods, Ltd^ Cobourg, Out. (Offer expires July 1, 1937.)