The little country theaterArvold, Alfred G. (Alfred Gilmeiden)
General
The little country theater
Arvold, Alfred G. (Alfred Gilmeiden)
Little Country Theater (Fargo, N.D.); Little theater movement; Theater -- North Dakota -- Fargo
All these answers and many more show something of the social conditions
in the country so far as women are concerned. In other words, older
people desert the country because they want better living conditions and
more social and educational advantages for themselves and their children.
Moral degeneracy in the country, like the city, is usually due to lack
of proper social recreation. When people have something healthful with
which to occupy their minds, they scarcely ever think of wrong-doing. A
noted student of social problems recently said that the barrenness of
country life for the girl growing into womanhood, hungry for amusement,
is one reason why so many girls in the country go to the city. Students
of science attribute the cause of many of the cases of insanity among
country people to loneliness and monotony. That something fundamental
must be done along social lines in the country communities in order to
help people find themselves, nobody will dispute. Already mechanical
devices, transportation facilities, and methods of communication have
done much to eliminate the drudgery, to do away with isolation, and to
make country life more attractive.
An influence which has done a good deal to stifle expression in country
people has been the narrow-minded attitude certain elements in society
have taken toward those who till the soil. When these elements have
wanted to belittle their city friends’ intelligence or social standing,
they have usually dubbed them “old farmers.” Briefly stated, the quickest
way to insult a man’s thinking power or social position has been to
give him the title “farmer.” The world has not entirely gotten over the
“Hey-Rube” idea about those who produce civilization’s food supply. A
certain stigma is still attached to the vocation. As a group, country
people have in many places been socially ostracized for centuries.
A social barrier still exists between the city-bred girl and the
country-bred boy. As a result, all these things have had a tendency to
destroy the country man’s pride in his profession. This has weakened his
morale and his one ambition has been to get out of something in which he
cannot be on an equal with other people, and consequently he has retired.
Goldsmith in “The Deserted Village” hit the nail on the head when he said:
“Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates, and men decay:
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade;
A breath can make them, as a breath has made;
But a bold peasantry, their country’s pride,
When once destroyed, can never be supplied.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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