European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - June 1, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                By Jules Loh associated press spirit of survival in Rural Kansas a t Harvest time last year the feeling of there on the Plains of Kansas was that in farm crisis had bottomed out. Nobody loll i could gel any worse ii did. Now Al planting Lime although Hope Springs  planting time Cloos that 1o Farmers they ate wondering How fat Down the Bottom might be curiously. Though. Like sufferers who Loam to endure pain. They seem to be dealing bettor with their plight at Leasi adjusting belter emotionally to misery and fear. The development is noteworthy because out if the isolation c Northeast Kansas one family s woe is visible to All. And. Like a storm Cloud Over the Prairie. Foreboding. In Clay Center a town of 5.000 people a spirit o survival still prevails even though since Harvest time the livestock Sale barn has gone broke and closed and the town s two farm implement companies have gone under. Roy cowing has closed his restaurant. He still runs the bar by is considering closing i two Days a week. Farmland values have dropped another 6 percent. Land is Worth about halt what it was live years ago nearly 8 percent of Farmers who have sought credit this Spring have been turned Down As opposed to 5 percent last year. Farm foreclosures and failures of country Banks have continued at last year s Well above Normal Pace. According to Mark Drabenstott of the Federal Reserve Bank in Kansas City.  in in a is 6.2 percent and in Clay Center. 11 percent. That s terrible for his  says a local banker and reflects 1he town s general economic doldrums. The banker 0. Ellon Mclntosh jr., like his lather before him is president of people s National Bank. The Bank which has served Clay Center Lor More than a Century remains sound despite heavy losses he says. Tan months ago Mcintosh had noted thai Many Loans being granted were merely delaying the inevitable and that a Point is reached where you have  while his Bank still has foreclosed on no one though it has witnessed some bankruptcies this year we be had to say no a lot he says and then Sohnly pronouncing each syllable we have said no a  like other Small town Bankers Mclntosh knows his customers by name. That is the deeper sadness of the farm troubles. Sterile statistics irom faraway Washington reflect no pain. Even this one the nation s farm credit system All its loan institutions had Nel earnings in 1984 of $373 million and in 1985 had losses of $2.7 billion. But in Clay Center and similar isolated farm towns the statistics translate into people known by name people who share pews and Coffee fables and whose children share school bus seats. Clay Center la irom any interstate has sat out Here on the windblown Plains for 126 years its people have identities lost in America s big cities and family histories that mention covered wagons. It is a town of five traffic lights and seven bored cops. It has one theater no parking meters a Bowling Alley 18 churches porch swings and a River. It has supermarket boys who take the groceries to the car. It has a Park with a band Shell. U has a Rescue squad a zoo iwo florists an undertaker a Library and a Pitta hut it has a radio station Hal broadcasts today s wheat futures and been prices and also the school lunch menu and Hospital admissions. Key cowing Hill runt it so Alhilda Jav trn in Clay Cantor but a had of Elota his restaurant. In America Smalt town defines not so much size As values and a Way of life proud neighbourly Independent lilt year to the dismay of some townsfolk who believe strangers ought to mind their own business it was reported in the papers that two Clay Cou lians who lost choir arms had attempted suicide. Since men one of the iwo has found other work. The other is dead. His car hit a Bridge at High Speed. His funeral was Well Al ended Clay county Farmers prospered like others in America during the heyday of the 1970s when farm prices boomed land values skyrocketed and Credd was there for the asking. Then came 19bo, the Export business soured As other nations got in the act. Selling cheap. The Dollar value Rose prices fell land values Feil and Farmers Lound themselves Over their Heads in debt Wilh Litile collateral. Hence the Larm  unlike other National worrier., such As. Say. Budget Defils. The sadness of the Frimi crisis is the intimacy of it yes. The two implement companies went out of business. It leaves Lar Merj without a place to get parts and ervice and 20 More people without jobs. But the people of Clay Center Don t think of it statistically. One firm was tha John Deere co., where la Mars had gathered Lor 80 years Lour generations to drink Coffee and shoot the Breeze a cd Itom thai began Back when the talk was about mule hitches. Over the years two of the company s owners had Ueen mayors. Trio other firm was the International Harvester franchise run by Dave Allison. Everybody in town know Dava Many also knew Hal seven years ago when he was 37. To had mortgaged his farm to raise pan of the Dawn payment on the business and borrowed the rest. Now he has Only debt. And friends. It s no that i m an isolated Case Allison says. The idea of a person tailing right now is not a Cardinal sin. No one has been mad at  thai attitude is new sort of. As recently As last year when Clay county was Well into its slump some Farmers who were still above water had the notion that those who had gone under had Only themselves to blame. Many who enl bankrupt believed it about themselves too. Guilt Sprou Lod in Kansas Liko sunflowers. Pastors and Counselor reported a rash of problems they had Seldom faced before increased divorce Rales suicide heavy drinking child Abuso. Statistics Are skimpy bul the same Counselor now say this has tapered Oft. People Are beginning to accept Hal their ate has More to do Wilh bad Luck than bad  says a Counselor who asked that his name be kept confidential. They seem to be More willing to come in and talk about it. Their troubles Are worse but their ability to Deal with them is  since inn late Harv to Kansas alone among the states started a Farmers assistance. Counselling and training service facts to provide free Legal financial and psychological advice. Its aim is to help save the farm or if that s impossible at least Cope with tha stress. It even has a suicide specialist on the staff. Wallet sized facts cards with a toll tree hot line 1 800-321-farm appeared All across the farm Belt. The staff geared up for As Many As 750 to 800 Calls the first six months of operation. It received 2,300. Gary Gilbert who operates a Grain elevator in Clay censer says he too. Believes that Farmers now accept the fact that it recovery comes it will be gradual. La s going to involve technological changes already begun that will be As profound on agriculture As he change seven or eight years ago from a labor intensive business to a capital intensive business he says. So All of this misery May in the Long Tun be Good Lor agriculture a cleansing process. They say cleansing is Good Lor the soul. That May be. But it s like going through the dts after a 10-year drunk. It s hell Whan it  Don Martin is one Clay county Larmer who knows that hell. Last fall Martin figured that if he did everything Righi and nature cooperated he might last Long enough to get in a crop this Spring. He made it. But he s still going through the wringer Martin is one of Clay county s most skillful and successful Farmers and a Lex Book example of what Many Farmers lace today. He graduated irom Kansas slate University in 1949, Page 11 the stars and stripes Sunda