[Illustration: H. H. Richardson, Brooklyn Heights, Ohio, agricultural graduate, Ohio State University, 1892. Fourteen years ago inherited 35 acres of land and an indebtedness of $1,750. He has raised a family of four children, has what is seen in the picture plus the land and $6,000 invested elsewhere. Mr. Richardson has held some local public office continuously during the past ten years, being at present member of school and water boards, member of advisory board of bank, secretary of Cleveland Fruit and Vegetable Growers' Association and Ohio vice-president of the National Vegetable Growers' Association.]
A farm with six work horses is rather a desirable one from several aspects. Among other things, it enables the farm owner to employ two men who can perform most of the team work with two three-horse teams, while at other times three pairs of horses may be arranged when the owner needs to use a team. This leaves the farmer time to attend to many activities not requiring horses, and time to plan the work and to look with more care after the purchases and sales. The size of such a farm will depend entirely on the nature of the activities. If it is a so-called general farm with a minimum of live stock, it would, perhaps, consist of from 150 to 180 acres of tillable land with some additional pasture and woodland. Ideally, every farm should have sufficient activity to make it something of a center. It should be an organism. It is difficult to organize one man.
It will be useful, when we come to discuss how profits may be estimated, to divide the capital into three general groups: (1) The plant, which in addition to the real estate, will include the machines and tools, horses used for labor, and other animals used for breeding purposes or for the production of animal products, such as butter, wool or eggs; (2) materials, which will include animals which are to be fattened for sale, and all seeds, fertilizers and foods intended to be turned into products to be sold; (3) supplies, which may include foods for teams, and money with which to pay labor, be this labor that of the farmer or his employees.
The purpose of this classification is to bring sharply into view the fact that the nature of different kinds of equipment varies. All the things named under the plant are in the nature of an annual charge against income. The charge under materials may or may not be an annual charge. If a man invests $2,000 in 50 head of cattle, which he intends to feed and sell for $3,250 at the end of one hundred days, he does not have to calculate interest on $2,000 for a year, but only for 100 days. Cattle paper is held in large quantities by banks in the cattle feeding districts of the United States. The farmer would, in fact, be unwise to keep $2,000 in the bank nine months in the year in order to use it three months. Like any other business man, if he has the money, he invests it and borrows the money to buy his cattle. The same thing applies to food and fertilizers. If the food is fed to cattle, some of the money invested in the food must pay interest during the fattening period. Food fed to dairy cattle and chickens may be paid for out of each day's income. In practice, the amount of money invested in food for dairy cattle and chickens is dependent only upon the most economical unit of purchase. One may apply fertilizers to buckwheat, give a three months' note for the fertilizer, and pay the note out of the proceeds of the crop. If the fertilizer is applied to one-year-old apple trees, this investment may be required to pay interest for fifteen years.