C" «■
VALLEY SETTLER
Publish'd every Friday at lalmer,
Alaska, b* the Matanuska Valley
Farmers Cooperatin£ Association for
the purpose of £ivin& news of the
Associat. ion1 s work, problems, ac
complishments, and news of local
and general interest.
P.y-l .Rasmussen.
Subscription rates: Yearly
Local $1.00
By Mai'1 1.75
Single dopy_. 10
THE FAR?
the "FORGOTTFF Ji!AN.H
f
Reconf new? items from the
States s’ v that there is some ap
prehens* ~ retarding the possibil
ity cf a 'hortage of farm products
for the ming. months of the War,
It seems ’ke the question of ships
tanks an'’ other supplies that were
so badly seded a year ago, has
been solv d, but now there looms
another great question, can we now
supply fr d and clothing to fill
these sh‘ a to supply the fighting
men and w men of our Allies and
ourselves':
This much must be said cf the
men and v, .men who operate our farms
that they too accepted the respon
sibility !hat goes with the waging
of a gret '* World War, their sons
were call.d to the colors to train
for the cu ttles to come, and often
it left f’ e farm without the man
power to 'nrry on the burdens that
must be carried, there was no
grumblinc on the part of the farm
folks. They as usual, took it for
granted 4 tat this was a part of the
war effort and carried on.
War industries offered higher
wages thru, the farmers could afford
to pay an farm laborors left the
farms for the so-called defense job
this left the farms stripped of
help and, women, children and older
people to->k up the burden. Still
there were other disheartening ob
stacles 4o be encountered, like the
difficulties of securing machinery
supplies and transportation. Now
in spite cf all this the farmers
produced ".ore than ever before,
while the men in uniform and the
men and women working in Defense
Industries were being praised by
Radio, Pr*. ss and Government offic
ials for their part in the war
effort, f e farmer plugged along
working longer hours, risking more
labor and capital just to do their
part, but few headlines were print
ed to praise their efforts and lit
tle was said for many months. Much
[to his credit the Secretary of Ag
riculture , Claude Wickard tried to
secure a more equitable division of
help to all of the War Defense work
ing farmers, but little heed was
given to his efforts, but when the
end of the year came and fifoures
were available to determine the a
mount of gains in the various in
dustries engaged in the war effort,
it was learned that the farmers had
earned a £iigh place in the totals.
Now we are asked to produce more
in the comine year. Can and will
the farmer meet this demand, we
think that they will, but each one
of us must do our part.
We in the Motanuska Valley have
our part to do too, there are cer
tain discouraging aspects to our
problems, however, let us not mag
nify those that can be adjusted but
try to secure those adjustments in
an orderly manner, and during the
meantime keep ri^ht on with our job.
If the problems mentioned in the
foregoing were only local problems
then we might not bo able to ex
pect any relief, but fortunately
for us, these are National in scope
and are of such importance that we
may expect to see some action soon.
Locally we have our own draw
backs r nd the question of credit is
a very serious one. We doubt if
this Valley can ever forfce ahead
until such time as we can have an
independent credit system, owned
and managed by the people of the
valley. We believe that a Produc
tion Credit Union will serve the
purpose. The reason that we feel
that an independent organization is
necessary is because we must have
all of the producing, farmers as mem
bers and that means both Colonists
and independents. We doubt if any
Independents will join any organ
ization that Is in any way connect
ed with the present Colony Manage
ment, because their interests ere
different, and there is a serious
doubt if the administration of the
Credit Union could be truly impart
ial of them were under such heavy
financial obligations, as most of us
are, to the influential agency that
controls the land rnd finances of
the Matanuska Volley.
When the farmers must provide
part of the capital and know that t
the failure on our part to repay
loans or the failure of our assoc
iates to repay their loans, will
cause loss to all of us, then there
will be a much different sentiment
In regard to meeting our financial
obligations.
(continued on page 4)