Midwest at Noon

PRESS Middle Western climate is as bad as Graham Hutton says it is, or whether Middle Western people are as kindly as he says they are, can be left for his readers to debate. Even such exciting matters as the frequency of shotgun weddings, or the question of whether a resident of Indiana is a Hoosier first and an American second, can be laid aside. His book offers richer fare and more solid chewing.

Mr. Hutton believes that the Middle West is disappearing as a separate section; that it is becoming part of an all-American industrial area. If so, then America has the wrong idea of the Midwest and the Midwest has the wrong idea about itself. It would not lie a rural-minded pocket in an industrial country. It would be the dominating influence on the all-American society Mr. Hutton believes is emerging.

He bases his conclusions on observations made chiefly during a wartime tour of duty as Midwest director of the British Information Service. In the manner we learn to associate with the articulate Britisher, he insists his book is merely a personal —almost a casual — commentary. But even those who know their Middle West the best will be struck by the originality and sharpness of Mr. Hutton s insight.

As befits the former associate editor of the London Economist, the author supports his thesis with the right Statistics. In eight states of the Midwest, he points out, 60 per cent of the people were living in towns of 2500 or more when the 1940 census was taken. In the “ industrial Last,” the comparable figure was 65 per cent. These and related facts mean to Mr. Hutton that the Midwest is “ now almost completely dovetailed with the East” as a single industrial area.

The national trend undoubtedly is toward greater unity and away from regional differences. It is possible, however, that Mr. Hutton underestimates one characteristic of the emerging unity: the influence of farmers and the rural life. During the industrialization of Great Britain and Western Europe, rural life lost its influence because food was being imported from the United States and Canada. But there are no similar stretches of unexploited land today. In this country we must sustain and perpetuate our own agriculture. Thus farmers and the rural life may have a greater weight in our future than they have yet enjoyed in any industrialized country.

If this prediction is a true one, then the Middle West will have a more profound and more original influence than Mr. Hutton now foresees. His book leaves one with the impression that he would think this altogether to the good.

AUTHOR MOORE