SEGMENT: FARMING METHODS, GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS, & FARM BUSINESS

Ruth Pauling>NIU Collection>NIU Collection, Segment 17

SEGMENT: FARMING METHODS, GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS, & FARM BUSINESS,

duration 10:40
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FARM BUSINESS
Does not recall price received for crops. Cattle 14 cents a pound in the 1940s. Everything cheaper in the 1940s. Details selling and trucking cattle. Humiliating experience at Chicago stock yards. Later years a buyer would come to farm. Corn was rarely sold but fed to cattle.
GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS
Did not participate much. Ruth feels most problems farmers had were not from government programs but from trying to get too big.
FARM BUSINESS
Rarely hired workers to help.
REFLECTIONS
Been retired for 6 1/2 years. Planned for future with good investments.
FARM EQUIPMENT
Tractors, combine, cars, not much large machinery. Husband preferred to have work custom done. Discusses cost of machinery compared to past and larger size of newer machinery.
FARMING METHODS
Used manure from cattle that they raised. Applied using a tractor and a manure-spreader. Recalls a story of having to spread manure on her birthday. Manure mixed with bedding. Does not think they used it on the crops unless their was an invasion. Used a spray tank pulled with a tractor. Couldn't see any difference in crops if it was sprayed or not. Using liquid nitrogen was dangerous. Took precautions.