NOW, Volume 3, Number 35, January 20, 1939 Page: 2
4 p. : ill.View a full description of this periodical.
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2 NOW
acting on his orders, the Missouri State
Cotuon Croppers Move Highway Patrol moved the 'croppers off
the roadside. The planters were willing
to take them back and many returned to
Mid-January travelers along Highways the homes they had abandoned, no bet-
60, 61 and 62 in Missouri's bootheel saw ter off than when they had left.the roadsides lined with tentless camps
of drenched, miserable families, huddled
around improvised stoves, unkempt, ill-
clad, hungry, shivering in the mud and
cold, thinly protected from rain, sleet,
snow and wind by flour sacks, bedding
and windbreaks made from their house-
hold furniture. The travelers learned that
these 1500 or more men, women and
children were cotton sharecroppers, who
under the persuasive oratory of a negro
preacher had moved from their farm
homes to the roadside to publicly protest
their low economic status.
Wretched had been their lot even be-
fore AAA cotton crop curtailment had
reduced the 1939 acreage. Most of the
planters, it was said, had told the 'crop-
pers they could stay and work on the re-
duced acreage, but had pointed out to
them that they could not, of course,
make even as much money as in 1938.
Then the negro preacher promised them
that if they would move in a body with
their household effects to the highways,
it would be but a brief time until the
government took a hand and permanent'
ly improved their lot. In the meantime,
they would be well fed.
It didn't work out just that way. The
preacher disappeared. Cold, rain, sleet
and snow came. Promised provisions did
not arrive. The days were trying. The
nights almost unbearable. Few slept.
Food supplies were soon gone and to re-
plenish them meant trudging for miles to
the relief centers, standing in line for
hours, filling out long applications. There
were no leaders, and they had no place
to go. "Why do we stay here?" said one
old woman. "We stay here because we
got no place else to go. It ain't no drier
in the ditch four miles from here than it
is right here."
Finally Dr. Harry Parker, Missouri
state health commissioner, declared the
camps a menace to public health, and,The most miserable of sharecroppers
are those who work for the prince of this
world, sowing to the flesh and of the
flesh reaping corruption; their wages
sickness, sorrow, death and eternal de-
spair. Many of them, realizing their own
pitiful plight, are encamped along the
road to destruction, leaderless, awaiting
some miraculous deliverance. Reformers,
preachers, social workers and others have
promised them all would be well if they
would just quit some bad habits, turn
over a new leaf, do the best they could,
shake the preacher's hand, join a church,
think nice thoughts. All this advice of
blind leaders has only landed them in the
roadside ditch.
But the Lord Jesus Christ is moved
with compassion for them as He was
nineteen hundred years ago for the mul-
titude which followed Him into the des-
ert, "scattered abroad as sheep having no
shepherd." And as He said to His disci-
ples then, so He says to His own today:
"Give ye them to eat." Give them to eat
from the Word of God, that they may
eat of the Bread of Life and live forever.
Tell them that the Lord Jesus Christ died
for their sins, that He was buried and
that He rose again the third day, and
that whosoever believeth in Him shall
never hunger or never thirst, shall have
eternal life. Tell them that from sin and
Satan He will make them free indeed.
Tell them He is saying, "Come unto Me,
all ye that labor and are heavy laden,
and I will give you rest. Take My yoke
upon you, and learn of Me; for I am
meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall
find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is
easy, and My burden is light." Matthew
11:27.
Could someone have honestly told the Mis-
souri cotton croppers that they were invited
to move to farms where their every need
would be supplied and a harvest there await-
ed their reaping, their roadside camps would
have been filled with singing and happy
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R.G. LeTourneau, Inc. NOW, Volume 3, Number 35, January 20, 1939, periodical, January 20, 1939; Peoria, Illinois. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1532497/m1/2/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting LeTourneau University Margaret Estes Library.