justly proud of their rural heritage
and their country homes.

I. The Triumph over Isolation.

_Conquering the Great Enemy of Rural Contentment_

The depressing effect of isolation has always been the most serious enemy
of country life in America. Nowhere else in the world have farm homes been
so scattered. Instead of living in hamlets, like the rest of the rural
world, with outlying farms in the open country, American pioneers with
characteristic independence have lived on their farms regardless of
distance to neighbors. But social hungers, especially of the young people,
could not safely be so disregarded, and in various ways the social
instincts have had their revenge. Isolation has proved to be the curse of
the country, as its opposite, congestion, has in the city. The wonder is
that the rural population of the country as a whole has steadily gained,
nearly doubling in a generation, in spite of this handicap. Obviously the
social handicap of isolation must be in a measure overcome, if country
life becomes permanently satisfying. We are not surprised, therefore, to
find that the new rural civilization has developed many means of
intercommunication, bringing the remotest country districts into vital
touch with the world.

Among the factors that have revolutionized the life of country people and
hastened the new rural civilization are the telephone, the daily mail
service by rural free delivery, the rapid extension of good roads, the
introduction of newspapers and magazines and farm journals, and traveling
libraries as well, the extension of the trolley systems throughout the
older states, and the rapid introduction of automobiles, especially
through the West.

In these various ways the fruits of modern inventive skill and enterprise
have enriched country life and have banished forever the extreme isolation
which used to vex the farm household of the past. The farm now is
conveniently near the market. The town churches and stores and schools are
near enough to the farms. The world's daily messages are brought to the
farmer's fireside. And the voice of the nearest neighbor may be heard in
the room, though she may live a mile away.

_The Social Value of the Telephone_

Among these modern blessings in the country home, one of the most
significant is the telephone. A business necessity in the city, it is a
great social asset in the rural home, like an additional member of the
family circle. It used to be said,