BLOWING THE WORLD AROUND WHERE TREASURES ARE CATALOGUED Here are catalogued the books and manuscripts of the Huntington Library. This bequest to the nation constitutes an incalculable aid to the liberal arts in this country. Personalities Thomas D. Campbell, Business-Farmer T HOMAS D. CAMPBELL, of to the soil to apply modern science and Hardin, Montana, is the super- modern business methods to the oldest power farmer. Probably no industry of civilized man. His brilliant man in the world has carried success is a lesson that is provoking ad the use of mechanical energy miring study among the leaders in the to such a degree in the creation of food farm movement, and may well point the from seed and soil. This past season he way out of the economic morass that farmed 35,000 acres of land in the semi- threatens American agriculture. arid West, and He treats used a million farming as a dollars' worth manufacturing of the highest process. He powerfarm ma regards seed chinery. With and soil and never more rain as the raw than 250 men materials of on the job, he that process, plowed, culti and farm mavated, and chinery as the seeded this vast machinery of a area, and har factory. He vested and says his busthreshed 380, iness is to 000 bushels of "manufacture wheat, 65,000 wheat." The bushels of flax, first task of the and 42,000 manufacturer bushels of oats. is to relate the Instead of the cost of producpower of muscle THOMAS D. CAMPBELL, BUSINESS-FARMER tion to the posin the bodies sible selling of men and horses that usually goes into value of his product; he instals an expert such an operation, he used the power of accountant to keep exact records of all 200,000 gallons of gasoline. expenditures and to analyze the records Mr. Campbell is the newest type of to see where the wasteful parts of his farmer. Born in a sod hut in the Red process are. River Valley of North Dakota, reared on Mr. Campbell did exactly that. He a pioneer farm in that same valley, work- quickly found what all manufacturers ing from childhood at the hard tasks of find, namely, that the cheapest prothat life, finally he went through the Uni- duction is attained by the largest use versity of North Dakota, took a post- of mechanical power to replace hand graduate course at Cornell in mechanical operation. He replaced men and mules and electrical engineering, and went back with the highest-power tractors, gaining PLOWING A FURROW SIX MILES LONG Mr. Campbell uses $1,000,000 worth of machinery on his Montana wheat ranch, including seventy-two big tractors. The picture shows fifteen tractors pulling gang plows on one operation. This outfit is able to plow a square mile a day, which is the record. speed and certainty in plowing and in Comparative cost studies led to the all the other farm processes. He leased following economy: For some time, it lands of such contour and size that ma was his practice to hitch six reapers to chinery could be used most effectively. one traction engine. The best speed the Then he hitched gang-plows to tractors, engine could make with this load was two put fifteen tractors abreast, sent them six miles an hour. By experiment he found miles in a straight line and plowed a fur that reducing the number of reapers to row 150 feet wide and six miles long. By four permitted the engine to increase its this process he can plow a square mile of speed to three miles an hour, and the land in a day. smaller outfit would do as much work in Next, he had accountants figure the a day as the larger. And of course there cost of this operation, and charged the was a large saving of the pay of the two items in such a way that they could be men on the extra two reapers, and in the compared with the costs of performing the cost of the reapers themselves. same operation with a different arrange Along with the economy of using maximent of men and machinery. This ac mum land areas, maximum power and the counting is carried to such a refinement refinement minimum of men, Mr. Campbell early that he knows to the fraction of a cent learned that the least expensive labor is the cost of lubricating oil that went into the highest paid. He picks the most skillthe production of every bushel of wheat. ful workers he can get, pays them the COST ACCOUNTANTS RETOUCHED THIS PHOTOGRAPH At first Mr. Campbell used six reapers hitched to one tractor, but his accountants told him that it would be cheaper to use four. In one day last summer his crews threshed 4,321 bushels of wheat in one day, a world's record for a single outfit. |