Farmers' Friend

Two months ago, J. H. Fanning of Hampton Bays, N. Y., was sad and puzzled. His son was dead, victim of an accident to his delivery truck. He had paid two dollars for an insurance policy which he bought with a subscription to the American Agriculturist. But when he wrote to the company, he was told that the accident was not covered by the policy. In his extremity, Farmer Fanning did what thousands of farmers in similar circumstances have done for three decades: he wrote to the Rural New-Yorker. "I am," he wrote, "asking your advice what, if anything, can be done in this case."

Last week, in the columns of the Rural New-Yorker, Farmer Fanning was told why there was little or nothing to be done. Similar complaints had been received which led the Rural New-Yorker, after investigation, to the conclusion that farmers were not told that the policy was strictly limited. The paper then spoke up fearlessly and characteristically: "Someone should start the 'Service Bureau' of the American Agriculturist after its own subscription racket."

Last year "R. N.-Y.'s" Publisher John J. Dillon received 23,240 letters touching every phase of a farmer's life. To the 1,296 with losses or grievances of various kinds, Publisher Dillon gave personal attention. He was able to collect on 1,008 of them. In 28 years his collections have totaled $1,013,995.85 on 36,975 claims. Many of these letters he prints in Publisher's Desk, a department "to set up definite guide posts so that our readers will recognize the earmarks of schemes, fakes and fraudulent appeals."

Publisher Dillon first went to work for the Rural New-Yorker in 1890 after a young manhood of farming, teaching and writing in and around Sullivan County. N. Y., where he was born. He became sole owner eight years later. Still spry at the age of Si. Publisher Dillon retains the twin passions of his youth: to get the farmer the highest possible return for what he sells and to get him full value on what he buys. With a bi-weekly circulation of 276.836, concentrated in the northeast, the Rural New-Yorker ranks 13th in U. S. general agricultural publications (first Country Gentleman, 1,590,609 monthly), second to none in editorial tone and reader affection. Currently, Publisher Dillon is campaigning strenuously against the Federal-State Milk Marketing Orders for New York because he believes them devised to aid his old enemy, the milk monopoly.

As a crusader and protector, the Rural New-Yorker has won complete loyalty from its readers and riches for its publisher. But the rare, often spiritual, quality of the paper comes from its readers', contributors' and editors' fundamental acceptance of soil, animals and weather as well as the rewards and misfortunes that befall them. "Weather conditions have made pruning almost impossible most of the time but I am slowly whittling away at it." writes a correspondent from Michigan. "I like to take my time..study each grapevine and select the best of the new canes to leave while I prune away all the old wood and most of the new. I like to have a reason for cutting away each branch on a tree instead of doing senseless butchering. With hundreds of trees and vines to prune there will be no Winter let-up in work for me. but work and the ability to work are grand blessings."

In appearance and content, the Rural New-Yorker remains what it has been for half a century even under youthful Editor William F. Berghold, the publisher's son-in-law. Most staff-written articles are simple, direct: what to do about heaves in horses, warts on cows, the newest wrinkles on ensilage and insect control. But there is always a strong evangelical-patriotic-old-time-religion flavor imparted from the numerous, and often well written, contributions such as the "Pastoral Parson," "Notes From Tennessee," "Rambling Along at Long Acres." Its advice on the editorial page last week might easily have been the shibboleth of the Rural New-Yorker: "It is a good plan to sit under a tree and look around once in a while."

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