Hard Times and Scientific Farming on the Stillaguamish
While the local economy struggles under an influx of job-seekers, a Snohomish County rancher embraces the march of progress with new steam machinery.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
STANWOOD, Aug. 16, 1878. The grain crop of the Stillaguamish is about two-thirds harvested, some late crops will be cut next week. W. B. Morse and others have their oats cut and threshed. Both crops yielded first-class, averaging about 54 bushels to the acre. We have two horse-power threshing machines on the flats, and a splendid new steam thresher arrived on today's steamer for Mr. McAllister, one of our leading ranchers, who calculates to 'do farming on scientific principles.' Success ever attend such enterprising citizens. Farmers here are constantly making improvements on their places and by these means are beautifying the already beautiful country. Mr. Oliver is making a new dyke around the river front of his place, thus enlarging his door-yard and orchard, which, when properly fitted up as he knows how to fit it, will make his place one of the nicest in the country. He has his house newly plastered and fitted up inside. Two men, Larson and Oleson, have located on the Big Burn, near Stanwood. They took a surveyor with them and had their claims properly surveyed. They report the Burn about five miles long and three wide, with good soil and very little clearing. Our place is over-run with men looking for work, not 'tramps,' but laborers who are willing to work. Wages are $1.50 and $2.00 per day in the harvest field. Some men are working for $1.25 per day.
“Our place is over-run with men looking for work, not 'tramps,' but laborers who are willing to work.”
In 1878, the Stillaguamish valley was managing a rural labor surplus by distinguishing between 'tramps' and willing laborers. Today, this resonates with the ongoing tension in Washington between agricultural labor needs and the high cost of living that drives workers away from seasonal jobs.
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