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SCS Is Unique: Experts Live Close to Job
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Principle of Big Business Is Employed in
i
Soil Organization
In many respects the organ-'!
izat ion- of the U. S. Soil Con
servation Service, reaching
from C. R. Hill, and his
aides of the Holt Soil Conserva
tion district, eastward to Wash
ington, is unique. The Soil Con
servation Service has borrowed
a page from big business, and,
because of that fact, it has hung
up a record for business effi
ciency.
In this region, including Ne
braska, 92.1 percent of all Ser
vice funds are used in giving di
rect assistance to farmers on the
land. Administrative overhead
amounts to only 7.9 percent.
The secret of cutting over
head to the minimum, Soil Con
servation Service officials point
out, lies largely in regional ad
ministration, not of farmers noi
of soil consei vation districts ov
er which the Soil Conservation
Service has absolutely no con- -
trol, but of its own employees.
The keynote of the entire pro
gram can be found in a state
ment made by Dr. Hugh H.
Bennett, chief of the service.
"When I was asked to take
i-charge of a nationwide pro
*'gram of soil erosion, he said,
"I immediately made UP “J
mind on several points which
I considered fundamental, we
would headquarter in Wash
ington, but we would send
our specialists out through
the country to work with
farmers cooperatively, we
would treat the land accord
ing to its capability and need*
and we would carry out a
unified rather than a haphai
ard and piecemeal program.
For the last 14 years the U. S.
Soil Conservation Service nas
operated on this basis station
ing the bulk of its technical
men out over the country where
they are needed and not in
Washington.
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O’NEILL
TRANSFER
John Turner, Prop.
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Daily Trips
Omaha to O’Neill
O'Neill to Omaha
Irregular Tripe
O’Neill to All
Nebraska Points
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Telephones:
O'NEILL—341-J
OMAHA—JAckson 3727
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Your Patronage
Appreciated
The most valuable men in the
entile Soil Conservation Service
live in O’Neill and in local
headquarters of the nation’s
other 2,000 soil conservation
districts. These are the farm
conservation planners and their
assistants, the men who are in
the front ranks of the nation’s
war on soil erosion, helping
farmers get the job done out on
the land, acre-by-acre.
In their home communities
every one knows them as John,
BiLl, or Pete, the fellow who
helps “our local soil conserva
tion district.” No plush offices
for these fellows. They find
headquarters where they can.
Offices matter little because
they are usually out in the field
from morning to dark anyway,
particularly during the crop
season.
They wear hob-nailed boots ;
which are no strangers to mud
or barnyard manure and their
working uniform may be denim
or khaki work pants. They go
to church, belong to the local
commercial or Lions club, pay
local taxes, since many of them
own their homes, and vote in
the town elections. Many of
them in this state are native
Nebraskans who are just as in
dependent as their neighbors
and who understand Nebraska s
problems intimately because
they were born here.
Few of their neighbors would
call these men outsiders from
"big government” in Washing
ton, nor are they. For soil ero
sion must be whipped by the lo
cal farmer and his neighbors
and although they are techni
cians they are also local citizens
who understand local problems.
If anyone tried to tell the farm
ers who supervise their own sou
district that this farm conser
vation planner was trying to
regiment them and tell them
how to run their business, he
would be hooted out of the hall.
Yet these farm conservation
planners and their aides are
paid by the federal government.
And the entire U. S. Soil Conser
vation Service, including us
work group headquarters at
Valentine, its state and region
al headquarters at Lincoln, ana
its national headquarters ™
Washington, is focused m the
work of C. R. Hill and his aides,
and others like them.
The administration of the
Soil Conservation Seme*
concentrates on the job of
curing men like Hill and
training them, supplying
them to soil districts which
ask for help and then furnish
ing them the necessary sup
plies, equipment and techni
cal supervision to keep them
abreast of all new scientific
developments,
From the work group and
state headquarters they receive
all necessary supplies and equip
ment. Matters of technical M
sistance are also handled oy
these two headquarters
The greater part of the teen
nical help, however, comes to
HOLT SOIL CONSERVATION DISTRICT
ANNUAL SEETHte
Preceding
GRASSLAND LIVSTOCK DAY
STUART. FEB. 28
9:30 A.M. — 10:15 A.M.
t
★ ★ ★
— Program —
Financil Report
i
Tree Program
Grass Program
• Machinery Rental
Progress Report
All cooperators are urged to attend
the annual meeting and stay on for
the remainder of the Grassland Live
stock Day Program
Ci
these local men from the re
gional headquarters. The small
staff at state headquarters is
concerned largely with business
management and administrative
matters.
The Soil Conservation Service
has stationed most of its spe
cialized technical men at seven
regional headquarters through
out the United States. This
saves traveling back and forth
to Washington. It also cuts costs
tremendously and gives quick
er service.
A. E. McClymonds is the re
gional director in Lincoln but
neither this headquarters nor
the one in Lincoln or Valentine
has any authority over farmers
in Holt Soil Conservation Dis
trict or any other farmers. The
Soil Conservation Service es
tablished these headquarters to
administer the work of its own
employees in helping Nebraska
farmers.
By concentrating its techni
cal men in a regional headquar
ters, the Service can provide
Hill and other local men with
technical help on any special
problem, such as a matter in
volving advanced engineering,
agronomic or range problems,
which may come up.
In regional headquarters are
engineering, agronomy, forest
ry, biology, soil and other tech
nical divisions. These are head
ed by technical men who are
specialists in their respective
fields.
It might not be feasible or
economical to hire a comple
ment of highly advanced men
of this type to help field men
in just one state. But by region
al administration, such special
ists are available to all six
states of this region which
means a substantial economy,
Soil Conservation Service offi
cials point out.
Operating out of the regional
headquarters, also, are other
advanced men known as zone
conservationists. The two who
come to the Holt county district
: on special problems which Hill
may encounter, are Joe Turell
and D. R. Vollicott. Such zone
teams include an engineer and
an agronomist. Their area cov
ers the northwestern Nebraska
and western half of South Da
kota and southeastern Wyom
ing where problems and their
solutions are similar.
There are other features of
regional administration which
bring about a substantial saving
in overhead. Office supplies,
pick-up trucks and many other
items necessary to keep Hill
and his assistants working effi
ciently are bought at regional
headquarters. Quantity purchas
ing saves money on such ma
terial.
All aerial maps and other
photographic work necessary
to the farm conservation
planner's operations are made
in one cartographic plant at
the regional headquarters in
Lincoln. Hence, one set of
employees and one invest
ment in equipment takes care
of 6 states, which would oth
erwise have to be duplicated
in each of the 6 states of
the region.
National headquarters of the
U. S. Soil Conservation Service
in Washington are largely re
sponsible for developing broad
policies governing the technical
work and coordinating the pro
gram throughout the United
States. The staff there is small
but adequate to do the job.
For C R. Hill, the national
office of Soil Conservation Ser
vice is a “far off” name which
few farm conservation planners
have time to visit. The typical
farm conservation planner is
avyare h' had to meet pretty
rigid requirements to qualify
for his job. He knows the Ser
vice will send him to a training
school if he needs it and will
keep him constantly informed
on every new technical develop
ment which research may re
veal. His checks, though usual
ly smaller tha private industry
would pay him, come regularly
and he seldom lacks the sup
plies he needs.
But neither Hill nor his as
sistants concern themselves
greatly with the ins and outs
of big scale operations else
where in the Soil Conservation
Service which saves the tax
payers a great sum of money
annually. They are more con
cerned over how soon they can
get to the farmers who have
applied to the district supervis
ors and help them get started
on their conservation plan. For
these are Nebraskans and the
Service’s local representatives,
after alL
And the local job comes first
Steers Gain 225-275
Pounds Per Acre —
At Lincoln, under normal
rainfall, steers grazed on brome
grass-afalfa pasture can be ex
pected to gain from 225 to 275
pounds per acre per steer. At
20-cents per pound of gain, the
return per acre of grass is
equivalent to a com yield of 50
bushels at $1 per bushel. Con
sidering cost of production, the
pasture should give a greater
net return than the corn. At the
same time the grazed land
would be improved in produc
tivity, whereas the corn land
would be reduced in productiv
ity.
NO QUOTIN' TIME’
IN CONSERVATION
Evenings, Sundays Spent
In Organizing Data
For Edition
There is no phrase “quitting
time” in soil conservation work
Of course, the same thing holds
true in many industries and oc
cupations.
After a cooperator has his
farm laid out for conservation
practices, the job is not com
pleted.
There is still operation of the
farm along conservation mea
sures, and a maintenance of the
various engineered projects,
such as terraces, shelterbelts,
waterways, etc.
Soil conservation is a full
time job in the operation of your
farm, day-by-day, week - by -
week, year-by-year, and cen
tury-by-century.
The editor of The Frontier
asked for our help in publishing
the Holt Soil Conservation
edition because of the realiza
tion that conservation is vital
to the strength of our country.
The conservation idea must be
instilled in this generation, the
next generation, the next, so
that it automatically becomes
a part of the farming operations
for centuries to come—long af
ter our time.
C. R. Hill believes this too,
and took on the gigantic task of
organizing and editing with the
aid of L. F. Bredemeier.
They are both employees
of the Soil Conservation Ser
vice, with a set salary and
certain work to do. They are
so much in earnest and sin -
cere in their belief that con
servation is vital and profit
able that there was no "quit
ting time."
Mr. Hill gave the conserva
tion practical application on
farms by day, and by night
gathered and assembled the ma
terial for this vital message to
Holt county farmers. When it
came press time, Hill did not
declare a “quitting time.” He
spent his evenings, Sundays,
and all available extra time
helping The Frontier staff in
properly presenting and organ
izing the material for publica
tion.
There is no “quitting time”
for the soil conservation prac
tices.
As far as the conservation ed
itors are concerned, there will
be no “quitting time” for pub
licizing conservation and its
tend0 t0 the indlvidual and the
, ‘'We have pledged before and
ve stiL pledge as much space
available in our regular paper
for the “preaching of the gos
pel” of conservation and the
“practicing of the preaching" of
that gospel.
“We believe that the future of
the county, towns, state, nation,
and over the world lies basical
ly in a productive agriculture.
We are selfish tn our beliefs—
though in a round-about way
"We feel as the Holt coun
ty farmers progress and pre
duce. our county and our
town will progress and pro
duce, and we will, in turn,
reap some of the benefits of
an economic stability.
“We believe'that if the soil is
held, we, too, will be able to
hand something to our children,
as will the farmer who practices
approved methods.
“We feel that our own small
part in publicizing conservation
—while the actual application is
up to the farmer—will be felt
and appreciated five hundred
years hence.
“There is no ‘quittin’ time’
in conservation of resources."
Good dairy cattle make very
efficient u£% of roughage and
pasture. These car. be grown as
conservation crops.
Grass roots granulate the soil,
thus making it easier to work
and more receptive of water.
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Phone 373 Wert O’Neill
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If OUR
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HE SELL CONSIGNMENTS ONLY
Fresh Consignments Are Sold Every Thursday
Beginning at 12:30 P.M.
“WHERE BUYERS AND SEILERS GATHER EVERY THURSDAY”
For Outstanding Livestock! !
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O’NEILL LIVESTOCK MARKET
Verne and Leigh Reynoldson, Managers
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