Charles Dana Wilber Quotes
[The plow] is the instrument which separates civilization from savagery; and converts a desert into a farm or garden.... To be more concise, Rain follows the plow.
Charles Dana Wilber, 1830-1891, Pioneer & Founder of Wilbur, Nebraska, Quoted on PBS The West, 2004
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The Diggers were a religious-economic movement that even today would be considered very radical. They advocated the right of the poor to go onto public lands and farm them—thus the name “Diggers.” Beyond their opposition to the private ownership of land to the exclusion of the poor, Winstanley and the Diggers promulgated another very modern doctrine: That the poor should take the responsibility and have the right to determinine how the society should provide for the poor. A version of this became one of the Mottos of the Poverty Program of 1964. See {616966}.
This was the justification for the Boer, South African farmers trekking North and seizing Black Native land
Because of the classic historical anti-Semitism and discrimination, Jews were barred from land ownership and as a result few were farmers or had agricultural experience in their families. They were tradesmen, artisans, professionals in Europe. So amongst Jews and non Jews alike the notion of Jews settling the land of Palestine and farming it or trapping, the way the Boers had in South Africa or the French in Canada, was not a very credible image. The Zionists, realizing this potential weakness, placed strong emphasis on agriculture, developed the agricultural kibbutz concept and encouraged Jews to become farmers. The effort was so successful that almost all the leading early Zionist immigrants to Palestine became farmers. When independence came to Israel, the Jewish agriculture was more productive than most of that in Europe and almost on a par with small farms in the United States. The Israelis were known for “making the desert bloom.
Responding to reporters queries regarding the administration's policy on dealing with the drought that was causing serious agricultural and economic repercussions:
The Depression had 25% unemployment and many people lacked even food to eat. Meanwhile, there was a huge amount of unused, idle land in California.
The reason for the secrecy was that he was informing Congress of the Lewis & Clark Expedition. Potentially, the Spanish, English or French might try to interfere with the expedition which was the precursor to American domination of the entire continent. Unfortunately, Jefferson’s plan for the Indians was not supported by many other Americans with the exception of New York State and the Iroquois remaining after many left after supporting the British in the Revolution. But the Iroquois who remained were already farmers in fixed communities and were experienced traders. Further, they had a complex governmental structure with many elements of democracy, and several had already succeeded in European educational settings. Their successful integration with the rest of New York can be demonstrated by the fact that New York is the only state where the average Native American Income is the same as the average white income, and there is no Indian gaming in New York. Jefferson’s vision, unfortunately, was never implemented in early the Westward Expansion.
Charles Dana Wilber was a land speculator, journalist and author, and a noted booster of the American West as a site of agricultural development. He founded the town of Wilber, Nebraska in 1873.
