Feeding the Hungry, P. C. Hiebert, 1929

tions and counter-revolutions, and the breaking down of the whole social and economic structure—took away from the masses the power, and still more, the desire to produce. Crop failure, or at least a poor yield, has been a common enough occurrence in parts of Russia, even among the Mennonites. The native Russians provided for such emergencies by burying a part of their crop in pits each year. After some experience, the Mennonites under the direction of the famous Cornies adopted the plan of storing in each village in a public store-room a certain percentage of each crop produced. This reserve was frequently ORGANIZING FEEDING OPERATIONS 205 drawn upon to help tide over local drought conditions. Sometimes it was shipped or hauled from one settlement to another. Later, when shipping and banking facilities had improved, the plan was modified. The grain was sold, the money invested, and in cases of emergencies drawn upon to buy grain as near as possible to the place where it was needed. This made the plan much more flexible, and enabled the stronger settlements to build up a reserve fund available for any real emergency. But when Russian money became worthless, those reserve funds were automatically wiped out. The change in Russia from prosperity and plenty to poverty and starvation came so abruptly that no one had time to adjust himself to it. From 1917 to 1920 the rest of the world knew little of what was going on in Russia, except that communism was being tried out on a grand scale. The news that filtered through the borders in spite of a strict government censorship was not encouraging. By 1922, even the sponsors of the new government were forced to admit that outside help was needed to keep the people alive. But however much the people would have suffered on account of the experiments that were being made on them, they might have succeeded in raising enough and keeping enough of it for themselves to sustain life, had it not been for the droughts that came after 1920. In some parts of Russia there was little rain in 1920, and especially was this true in the Volga section. In the Ukraine only small areas were severely affected that year, and the people were not so poor but that they were able to take care of themselves. In the fall of 1920 the drought became general over the southern part of the Ukraine. All fall and winter there was practically no rain. By March, 1921, it had become so dry that the fall grain was being blown out by the roots. Continued dry weather made it impossible to 206 FEEDING THE HUNGRY put out any spring crops. At one place there was a little rain on Easter day, then again several weeks later, and then not a drop until August 5. There was no pasture for the stock, and little other feed. The small amount of grain the people managed to sow that fall, lay in the ground until the following spring. With the coming of the spring of 1922, there was rain and the pro