••- _j PALMER, ALASKA__
Published every Friday at Palmer, Alaska, for the Matanuska V.- ] 1
ey Farmers Cooperatirtg Association, for the purpose of giving news
the Association's w4>hk, problems, and accomplishments,_
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WORRYING AND THE SURPLUS
If you want to do some worrying, .spend a few restless nights tryfrv
ing to figure out whet should and could he done with all the surplus
war materirls r.nd mrnufacturing plants that will be around when the
shooting rnd the bombing have ceased. Tanks, power shovels, trucks
and jeeps. Airplanes by the thousands. Airports here and there and
everywhere. Thousands of houses and their f\irnishings built for war
workers and military employees. B -arracks on a thousand fields. Boats',
boats, boats. Tents, parachutes, ammunition, landing barges. Food
stuffs, military clothin, army bedding and mosquito nets. And then the
huge and costly plants in which all these and countless other things
were manufactured; plants some of which are adapted to civilian indus
try but many of which can play little part in anything but war. Or
can they?
Personally, I would like to have one of those jeeps to go fish
ing in, and one of those army tanks to combat these horn-honking road
hots with. I could use an army blanket .and possibly a few rounds on
cc’-ote ammunition. But so help me, if I and a hundred million other
fc :s should acquire and use these war leftovers * to just the exten*
wt Hd it we would be limiting the market for labor in those .days o*’
transition to peace. You know, this surplus stuff might become a m 1
stone abp\lt our necks as a huge surplus of wheat once served as a
sinker for the wheat farmer.
So anybody who wants to do some high-class worrying can find
plenty to worry about. But I guess we had better worry about winning
the war first. Otherwise, Hitler and T.ojo might get to do the worry
ing over this surplus war goods problem.
Washington Farmer.
OUR FART OF THE JOB
Nothing we can do at home can compare with what’the boys on the
battle fronts are doing. No task and no privation is worth consider
ing when we remember the soldiers and sailors to whom the enemy's tor
pedo, bomb and bullet carry death.
Our home front job is to proBuce or help pay for (or both)
the supplies the boys must have if they are to win an early victory
and thus bring to an end the carnage of war.
These are some of our simple and sefe duties: Produce foods;
salvage essential waste materials; conserve gas, oil, rubber, machin
ery, food; help finance the war by putting our money into war bonds.
Any of us who is negligent in service of this*kind is not carry
ing his share of the responsibility in the war effort. The boys
facing the bullets of barbarism are not negligent. Are we?