Conservation Resources 
 Lig-Free® Type I 
 Ph 8.5, Buffered 
 
1 
 
 The Account of a Trip 
 Along the 
 
 Pacific Coast Extensio 
 
 of the 
 
 Chicago --^ 
 
 Milwaukee & St. jRiul 
 
 Railway 
 
 'No one can controvert the visible fact of 
 growing crops." 
 
PASSENGER REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ,-* « <L 
 
 Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway 1 
 
 ABERDEEN, S. D 0. F. Waller, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 BOSTON— 368 Washington Street W. W. Hall, New England Passenger Agent 
 
 BUFFALO— 303 Main Street J. H. Skillen, Commercial Agent 
 
 BUTTE, MONT. — 51 East Broadway P. H. Scanlan, Commercial Agent 
 
 CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA C. J. Mikesh, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 (qs: Ariomc cfrnof S ^' ^* Souther, General Agent Pass'r Dep't 
 
 CHICAGO ^^^ Aaams street ^Ernest G. Woodward, Traveling Pass' r Agent 
 
 I 348 Marquette Building Geo. B. Haynes, Immigration Agent 
 
 CINCINNATI— 24 Carew Building C. C. Mordough, Traveling Passenger Agent 
 
 CLEVELAND— 426 Superior Ave. N. W E. G. Hayden, Traveling Passenger Agent 
 
 DALLAS, TEXAS— 249 Main Street »^ M. F. Smith, Commercial Agent 
 
 DAVENPORT, IOWA— 303 Brady Street P. L. Hlnrichs, Commercial Agent 
 
 DENVER— 821 17th Street J. E. Preston, Commercial Agent 
 
 DES MOINES, IOWA — 410 Walnut Street S. H. Vaughan, Division Pass'r Agent 
 
 DETROIT— 212 Majestic Building Robert C. Jones, Michigan Passenger Agent 
 
 DUBUQUE, IOWA— 597 Main Street S. N. Baird, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 DULUTH — Palladio Building '. . . . C. L. Kennedy, Commercial Agent 
 
 HOUGHTON, MICH H. E. Stewart, Commercial Agent 
 
 INDIANAPOLIS— 313-314 Lemcke Building F. N. Hicks, Traveling Passenger Agent 
 
 KAN^;^:; CITY, MO.— 907 Main Street G. L. Cobb, Southwestern Passenger Agent 
 
 LlVfi:BPOOL, ENGLAND | ^^ Ja^m^fst!," \ •'^' Jackson & Sons., European Agents 
 
 LOS ANGELES— 130 West Sixth Street E. K. Garrison, Traveling Passenger Agent 
 
 MADISON, WIS W. W. Winton, District Passenger Agent 
 
 MASON CITY, IOWA W. P. Warner, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 MILWAUKEE — iOO East Water Street W. J. Boyle, General Agent Passenger Dep't 
 
 MTTVTMW A pnr T<a 5 328 Nicollet Ave C. R. Lewis, City Passenger and Ticket Agent 
 
 fl'xiixixj3.Afui.i& ^ Metropolitan Life Building. .. .A. S. Willoughby, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 NEW ORLEANS— 517-518 Hibernla Bank Bldg W. H. Rogers, Traveling Pass'r Agent 
 
 NEW YORK— 381 Broadway W. S. Howell, General Eastern Agent 
 
 OMAHA — 1524 Farnam Street r. F. A. Nash, General Western Agent 
 
 OTTUMWA, IOWA W. C. Parker, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 PHILADELPHIA— 818 Chestnut Street Geo. J. Lincoln, Commercial Agent 
 
 PITTSBURG— Room D, Park Building John R. Pott, District Passenger Agent 
 
 PORTLAND, ORE.— 134 Third Street H. S. Rowe, General Agent 
 
 RAPID CITY, S. D C. B. Wilser, Commercial Agent 
 
 SALT LAKE CITY— 106 West Second South St 0. S. Williams, Commercial Agent 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO— 22 Powell Street C. L. Canfleld, General Agent 
 
 SEATTLE— 517 Second Avenue R. M. Boyd, Commercial Agent 
 
 SIOUX CITY, IOWA J. G. Love, Division Passenger Agent 
 
 SPOKANE— 618 Riverside Avenue R. L. Ford, Freight and Passenger Agent 
 
 ST. LOUIS S\?fom!"K;. }■■■'■ =• ••«"»•■ C.mmercl.1 Agent 
 
 err DATTT oo- « V * «x \ ( W. B. Dixon, Ass't Gen'l Pass'r Agent 
 
 bl. PAUL— 365 Robert Street "I ^ p^ Rovig, Northwestern Pass'r Agent 
 
 TACOMA— 117 South Tenth Street H. J. Manny, Traveling Passenger Agent 
 
 TORONTO. ONT.— 8 King Street East A. J. Taylor, Canadian Passenger Agent 
 
 WINNIPEG— 349 Main Street J. I. GUlick, Commercial Agent 
 
 J. H. HILAND, F. A. MILLER. 
 
 Third Vice-President. General Passenger Agent. 
 
 CHICAGO 
 
 No. 209 
 
OPPORTUNITIES IN THE WEST IN AGRICULTURAL, 
 STOCK-RAISING, MERCANTILE AND PROFES- 
 SIONAL LINES ARE EXCELLENT. 
 
 The Paeifie Coast Extension of the Chieag^o, Milwaukee & St. 
 Paul Railway passes through a promising country. 
 
 Lewis and Clark raced Simon Fraser for the Empire of the Northwest 
 through the mountains a century ago. The Forty-niners went through, some 
 of them, and starved or froze before they reached the "Chinook" country. 
 Ranchmen loudly swore that the country was "good for nothin' but grazin' — 
 you couldn't raise a peck of onions between the Mississippi River and Puget 
 Sound," and to prove it imported supplies with elaborate ostentation, selecting 
 condensed milk and canned meats and dried eggs and vegetables as if tney were 
 living in the Arctic Circle. 
 
 Then the big railroads began to head westward toward California and the 
 Coast, and each new line swung farther north. The locating engineers came 
 back from the "Great American Desert" and told "The Old Man" in confidence 
 that thej^ believed farmers could raise wheat and potatoes and apples in the 
 valleys of these long-tabooed lands. It looked good to them. 
 
 So it happened that in the summer of 1907 John Doe — it would never 
 do to be too personal in the matter of names with a man as important as 
 John Doe — went out to see for himself. He did not travel in a private car 
 and acknovvdedge reception committee ovations. He dropped casually into 
 the offices of business men — bankers, real estate dealers, grocers, blacksmitiis 
 — and many of them were calling him "Johnny" before he left. He swapped 
 stories with farmers in their fields; he got out of his buggy and poked into 
 promising soils and outcropping coal-veins and five-foot wheat-shocks ; he 
 slept at farms and ranches and hotels called "The Palace"; he drove many 
 hundred miles in all sorts of weather, and he gained a clearer knowledge of 
 the country as a whole than anyone else had ever secured before. 
 
 The account of his trip follows. It is the plain business narrative of a 
 plain business man who went into the Northwest with the questions in mind: 
 "Is this country able to support agriculture ? Will it raise wheat and potatoes 
 and apples instead of sagebrush and mountains ? Is it 'God's country' ?" 
 
 It is not necessary to answer these questions here. As he says, "no one 
 can controvert the visible fact of growing crops," and his account of what he 
 sa\7 in actual bushels and acres is the most convincing reply. 
 
 OPPORTUNITY LAND 
 
 There is, in our northern tier of states, between Minnesota and Puget 
 Sound, a wealth of resource in field and forest and mine of which the majority 
 
of people in the United States know little or nothing. Even the most open- 
 minded can gain from word of mouth or printed page only a sliglit realization 
 of a thing so great. I am no broader than the generality of my fellow men 
 and the tales I had heard of the development of that country, of the tremen- 
 dous crops and the quick return for labor invested, had made but little im- 
 pression. But when I got there myself — when I rode from early morning till 
 the dark fell, past splendid farm land and splendid crops — when I saw the 
 enterprising, bustling, booming towns, large and small — when I talked with 
 the level-headed, energetic, prosperous people — then it was a different matter. 
 Then I wondered at the misleading moderation of the accounts that I had 
 heard. 
 
 It was no hurried, casual glance I gave to any part of that broad, splendid 
 land. I neighbored there. I watched its crops grow. I investigated its mines. 
 I compared its fruits. I examined its cattle. I drove behind its horses and 
 broke dovm in its automobiles. I ate facts about everything, and I enjoyed 
 them. For they were mighty good facts, well-rooted and palatable. I stayed 
 until I was convinced that the time is very near when this last and perhaps 
 richest portion of our country will take its fair proportion of the people and 
 its proper plane in the world's economy. 
 
 RAILROADS NECESSARY 
 
 And now that I am returned from my long journey, the question comes: 
 What is needed that this great empire may come into its own? The answer 
 is as old as the hills. Pioneer railroad lines everywhere have demonstrated 
 beyond doubt the richness and resourcefulness of the silent places with, and 
 their utter worthlessness without, transportation. The wilds and wastes con- 
 quered, the business enterprises brought into being, the deserts drenched, the 
 wilderness penetrated, and the mountains pierced — in short, the millions of 
 homes made ready for the habitation of man by what may be called pioneer 
 lines make up an overwhelming refutation of the new contention that the 
 railroad is a non-producer. In the matter of opening up new territories, it is 
 the first, the pioneer producer, which can claim credit, wholly or in part, for 
 everything from the first cleared field and the saw mill spur, to the fine farm 
 and the city — for the finished products, which are civilization. 
 
 As for the northwest states, the rich land is there. The people "are going 
 there. What is needed is more of them. When the new straight-tracked, 
 strongly-built railroad makes its SM'ift, short passage from the grain fields 
 to the great grain markets; vrhen its builders complete what is already begun 
 — then will there be a new empire where millions shall find homes and whence 
 wealth shall flow out to the whole world. 
 
 IN THE DAKOTAS 
 
 It was on the evening of July 12th that I left St. Paul and I arrived the 
 next night at Dickinson, North Dakota, having spent the day in studying 
 pamphlets and getting what information I could from the v/estern men I met 
 on the train. There was no douljt in any of their minds about the West being 
 "tlie best country on earth." The following morning I started on a four days' 
 drive through Hettinger, Adams and Bowman counties. North Dakota, and 
 Butte County, South Dakota. It had been raining energetically, but we 
 
didn't stop for that: We made an early start and did some sixty-five miles 
 the first day. 
 
 Hettinger I found to be typical of a certain class of western towns; 
 ahead of the railway, the residences mostly tents, the population about one 
 hundred. It had three general merchandise stores, tvro banks, a lumber yard, 
 a cigar and candy store, a two-story hotel, a livery barn, two barber shops, 
 one newspaper, one doctor, several lav.yers and real estate agents — a good 
 town — and when the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railv/ay goes through 
 there, it will be a big town. Much of the land about there has been home- 
 steaded and next year it will be producing big crops. 
 
 GOOD SOIL— GOOD CROPS 
 
 I met a locator who had just returned from thirty-six miles south of 
 Lemmon and asked him about the agricultural possibilities of the land. 
 
 "It will raise as good crops as any on earth," he said. "All the land for 
 ten or fifteen miles each side of the Milwaukee has been taken up; home- 
 steaders on every section. It's mighty good soil." His verdict was the general 
 one. 
 
 Tlie same is true of the country about Lemmon, S. D. All the land for 
 several miles on either side of the railway has been taken up. Mr. Aldrich, 
 a banker at Lemmon, which is a larger town than Hettinger, told me 
 that excellent varieties of corn could be grown, quoting from his owa experi- 
 ence. 
 
 "I figured that a better article could be raised on this soil," he said, "and 
 so I did a little experimenting out of office hours. I tried two or three 
 varieties with great success, but the Dent seemed to do the best, so I confined 
 myself to that. Anyone can acclimate a good corn." 
 
 I talked with all kinds of people, ranchmen, locators, homesteaders, set- 
 tlers, business men, real estate men, etc. ; and examined the grass and fields 
 of a section of land covering roughly some 4,600,000 acres of good soil. I ex- 
 amined the land with the principal questions in mind: Is this an agricul- 
 tural country? Can crops be grown regularly with the average amount of 
 rainfall ? 
 
 One conversation I had with a rancher at Haley, south of the line, was 
 characteristic. "Look here," he said, in response to my invariable query, and 
 led me out behind the barn where he had a thrifty field of oats and squaw 
 corn: "Just look at that. That's my best answer to the question. I've 
 raised as good as that, or better, for the last twenty-three years, ever since 
 I've been in this territory, and if I can do it others can. Others will, too, 
 Tliat's the trouble. They've crowded us ranchers out of the middle west, and 
 out of Wyoming, and out of a lot of Texas, and tliey'll crov/d us off into the 
 Pacific Ocean pretty soon to feed our beef creatures on seaweed." 
 
 Another rancher shewed me a field of oats he had put in. "That iicjd, 
 sir," he affirmed, "will go sixty bushels to the acre if it will go a peck. 
 There isn't a finer field in the t'.vo Dakotas." 
 
 I said nothing, but I was amused, since both of these men had been tell- 
 ing me that the land v/as made for grazing country and ought to be left for 
 tiiat. Naturally the ranchers have resented the necessity of giving up the 
 free range and have tried for years to discourage i7nmigration. Their dis- 
 paraging statements I took thereafter with a large grain of salt. 
 
ADAMS AND HETTINGER COUNTIES, NORTH DAKOTA 
 
 From Lemmon I drove north to Mott, N. D., traversing about forty miles 
 of country in Adams and Hettinger counties. The country I found similar 
 to that over which I had driven for four days except that it lies, if anything, 
 still better for farming. Throughout the entire country the houses of home- 
 steaders dotted the prairies. I saw fine fields of wheat and barley just south 
 of Mott, K D., proving, as other fields in other parts of the country had 
 done, the productiveness of the soil. One man north of Mott last year raised 
 5,000 bushels of wheat. A number had each over 400 acres in crop this year. 
 This grain will naturally tend south to the Milwaukee, as the wagon roads 
 are better to the south. 
 
 Mott is a well built towTi tributaiy to the Chicago, Milwaukee & 
 St. Paul Eailway. Tlie one general store does a thriving business, as the 
 farmers have made money raising grain. It is astonishing the amount of 
 business those little one and two store towns do. At New England, thirty-five 
 miles south of Dickinson, I was in a general store that buys two thousand 
 dollars' worth of groceries every month. This information was given me by 
 two different commercial men at Dickinson. The business is equally large in 
 other lines. At Haley there is a little bank less than a year old with a capital 
 of ten thousand dollars which has thirty-six thousand dollars in deposits and 
 t-'Vcuty-four thousand out at interest. 
 
 DIVERSIFIED FARMING COUNTRY 
 
 I returned to Dickinson on July 18th, driving from Mott, a distance of fifty 
 miles, and traversing a country containing more farms than any I had pre- 
 viously^ seen. I talked with farmers in this section and they scoffed at any 
 doubt that the region was good farming country. There had been plenty of 
 rain : Indeed, personally, I could have dispensed with a little of the precipita- 
 tion, for it rained more than half the time that I was on the road. 
 
 Young Phelan, who is very familiar with the country, took me out to see 
 the State Experimental Farm where, under the most improved dry-farming 
 methods, they raise all kinds of grain, shrubbery, fruit trees and vegetables. 
 They have succeeded in doing some things hitherto considered impossible. 
 
 I felt that I now had the Dakota situation well in hand. I had driven two 
 hundred and fifty miles in five days, covered about two hundred townships and 
 talked to heaven only knows how many different kinds of people. 
 
 The country, all in all, is of the same general aspect, valleys several miles 
 broad and well suited to farming lying all along the water courses. Between 
 the streams the land for miles is a succession of hills, rolling prairie, and 
 buttes, the larger per cent being plough land. The natural grass that covers 
 this is so nutritious that cattle fatten on it without being fed any grain or 
 given protection against the weather. 
 
 In every place I visited I saw splendid growing crops. I saw beside 
 wheat (blue stem and durum), flax, and potatoes, which were the principal 
 crops, barley, oats, speltz, corn, and all kinds of garden vegetables and clover 
 and alfalfa. 
 
 There can be no possible question as to the productiveness of the soil. 
 No one can controvert the visible fact of growing crops. 
 
 The water in the district is good and is easily secured at from twenty to 
 sixty feet. 
 
COAL— FREE FOR DIGGING 
 
 That whole section seems underlaid with lignite coal, a great deal of it 
 outcropping. The fuel question is often a serious one on the prairie and I 
 asked the wife of a farmer what they burned. 
 
 "Why, there's a coal hole about three miles from here," she answered. 
 "John goes over and gets a few loads when he isn't busy. We don't have to 
 worry about keeping warm." 
 
 I examined this coal at several places. It seems to be about half way 
 between wood and bituminous coal. When first taken from the ground it shows 
 the veins and knots of the wood of which it was formed. It slacks on exposure 
 to the air. Two tons of it are snid to equal one ton of bituminous coal. The 
 veins vary from three to twenty feet below the surface. 
 
 IN EASTERN MONTANA 
 
 Miles City was my first experience of Montana, and a pleasant one. 
 They told me there that the land had produced crops for three years and 
 was selling at about ten dollars an acre. I drove out to the irrigated lands 
 south of the town, where a ditch from the Tongue River irrigates an exten- 
 sive tract about fourteen miles long on whir-h fine crops were growing. 
 
 The next day I went to Terry, which is a busy town well located in a 
 big flat. Mr. Burt, president of the bank, took me out to his ranch in his 
 automobile; at least, we covered about sixty miles of the distance in the 
 automobile before it broke down. After that we did ten miles on horseback 
 and five on foot. I had an excellent view of the countr}^ along the new 
 St. Paul Railway and also of the country back in the hills. Tlio soil is all 
 right and I saw field after field of flourishing crops produced without any 
 irrigation. 
 
 Forsyth was my next stop and there I was much interested in the 
 project of the Rosebud Land and Improvement Company, which has con- 
 structed an irrigation ditch that waters 11,000 acres of land across the Yel- 
 lowstone River from Forsyth and extending east. 
 
 The Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway has a townsite in the center 
 of this irrigated tract, which will be placed on the market, divided into small 
 holdings, when the trains are running through. A beet sugar factory is to 
 be located there. 
 
 IN THE JUDITH BASIN, MONTANA 
 
 I spent several days in and about Lewistown, as the Judith Basin in 
 which the town is situated is considered the greatest country in Montana 
 for dry-farming. 
 
 It was wonderful! Simply wonderful! The first day I drove with Mr. 
 G. W. Cook for fifteen miles through the farming country and I never before 
 saw such wheat fields. 
 
 Mr. Cook pointed with his whip to right and left and left and right with 
 tlie succinct remark: 
 
 "Forty bushels. . . Forty bushels. . . Forty bushels.'* 
 
 I did not doubt it in the least. Tlie grain was as thick as it could 
 grow and the heads were extraordinarily big and heavy. Fifty bushels to 
 the acre is not uncommon. The grade was No. 1 Hard, a fine milling wheat 
 
that sold last year at $1.25 per cwt. That land sold for from ten to twenty- 
 five dollars an acre, averaging about fifteen dollars. I was told that there were 
 areas of land as good as that that were still raw prairie or "bench land," 
 as they call it. 
 
 The Judith Basin is a tract of about 2,000 square miles. I drove for hun- 
 dreds of miles over it. The basin is well watered by numerous streams and 
 springs which never fail in summer nor freeze in winter. It raises mag- 
 nificent crops. Hay (timothy, alfalfa, broom grass and blue joint) and 
 oats are invariably great producers. On the "bench lands," or prairies, 
 between the creeks, the great wheat crops are raised, thirty, forty, and fifty 
 bushels being harvested to the acre without irrigation. The basin seems 
 a natural wheat country. The climate, long days and cool nights, the altitude 
 and the soil are perfectly adapted to this grain. Turkey Red and Scotch 
 Fife are the varieties commonly grown. The prices have been largely gov- 
 erned by local conditions. The yield in the basin is estimated at 350,000 
 bushels. About 80 per cent of the land can be ploughed. About 10 per 
 cent is under cultivation. South and east of the railroad the country has 
 been settled up for several years, north and west most of the land has been 
 homesteaded for one or two years and is developing rapidly. Last year 
 74,000 acres in Fergus County w^ere homesteaded. But there is still good 
 land open. Fergus County has a population of 12,000 and could easily 
 support 500,000. It is a great opportunity for the eastern farmer. The 
 ranchmen who have held the country so long have bought condensed milk, 
 canned meat, stale eggs, and desiccated vegetables without ever thinking 
 to raise such things for themselves. And yet nearly all vegetables and 
 small fruits io well; apples can be raised, and potatoes make a big crop of 
 excellent quality. 
 
 The sheep industry is another profitable one, bringing last summer a 
 million and a quarter dollars into Fergus County in sales of wool and sheep. 
 
 The more I saw of the region the more I was impressed with it. It is 
 certain to be a great country. 
 
 ABOUT LEWISTOWN, MONTANA 
 
 Lewistown, with a population of about 3,500, presented a fine appearance. 
 Everybody seemed to be making money. Wool, sheep, cattle and horses 
 were high, and the gold mines to the north that get their supplies here are 
 big producers. The largest bank there carries over $1,300,000 deposits. 
 
 The next day I drove north to the mining town of Kendall, passing 
 through a country that is being extensively farmed without irrigation and 
 producing the same class of crops that I have described. The production of 
 this land is almost unbelievable. 
 
 Kendall is a lively little town. The Kendall and Barnes-King mines 
 produce something over $1,000,000 in gold every year. Fergus County is 
 developing its coal mines also, which will furnish employment for many 
 men. Government geologists vrere camped near one of the mines that I 
 visited and they said there was coal all over the basin. It is a fair quality 
 of bituminous, and sold in Lewistown for $5.00 a ton, delivered. 
 
 As each successive range oi the Ilocky Mountains is passed, the climate 
 grows continually milder, Tbe fertile valleys of western Montana are becom- 
 ing famed for their fruit. 
 
Missoula, Mont., has a climate that is considered perfection. There 1 saw 
 hundreds of small fruit farms of from 10 to 20 acres, the owners of which had 
 grown independent. 
 
 The mining towns, Butte and Anaconda, and the Coeur d'Alene mining 
 country to the west, make perhaps the best market for fruit in the West. 
 
 IN IDAHO AND WASHINGTON 
 
 St. Joe City, Idaho, is a good lumbering and manufacturing point. I went 
 from there to 8t. Marie's, fifteen miles down the river, which is already a 
 prosperous place and will grow rapidly with the advent of The St. Paul Road. 
 I saw flats containing from ten to one hundred acres of fine meadow, grow- 
 ing magnificent crops of timothy hay. Those lands are all settled and are 
 valuable. Hay sells for from $16.00 to $20.00 a ton, and the land is held 
 at from $100.00 to $150.00 per acre. Besides these flats, which are nearly 
 level with the river, there are small valleys which raise nearly ail kinds of 
 fruit to perfection. The soil and climate are ideal for peaches, plums, apri- 
 cots, apples and all kinds of small fruits. Wlien the railroad furnishes trans- 
 portation it will be a great fruit growing section. 
 
 I reached Tekoa, Washington, the 13th of August. The harvest was in 
 full swing and looked fine. It is a beautiful country. 
 
 Tekoa itself is a thriving town of about a thousand people, with paved 
 streets, electric lights, city water, etc. Toward Rock Lake the country is as 
 fine as any in the state. It is a succession of hills on which enormous crops 
 of small grains are grown. As high as fifty bushels to the acre is not uncom- 
 mon, and hundreds of acres will average forty bushels. The land is nearly 
 all under cultivation, but is held in large tracts, thousand-acre farms being 
 frequent. The soil is a dark loam of wonderful fertility, and the rainfall 
 is sufficient. Wheat, oats and barley are the main crops. Potatoes often 
 make GOO bushels to the acre. Good wells are easily found, water being from 
 fifteen to forty feet below the surface. 
 
 From Tekoa I drove fifteen miles to Rosalia, a progressive towoi v.ith 
 good schools and all the conveniences of an eastern city. It contains men 
 worth from forty thousand to one hundred thousand dollars who came here 
 ten or twelve years ago with practically nothing. 
 
 "The crying need of this country," a business man told me, "is that the 
 big holdings on which we old-timers made our money be cut up into little 
 farms of forty or fifty acres. An excellent living can be made off a forty- 
 acre farm. We need more people in the country to raise vegetables and fruit 
 and poultry and dairy produce. The mining country to the east, and Spokane, 
 as well as our local markets, would eat up all they would raise." 
 
 A GREAT FRUIT COUNTRY 
 
 Around Ellensburg, v/hich I made on August 21st, the whole country is 
 irrigated land in a high state of cultivation. There are 50,000 acres of 
 irrigated and sub-irrigated land that will be tributary to the Chicago, lilil- 
 waukee & St. Paul Pvailway, as well as 80,000 acres more that can easily 
 be irrigated, I rode some eighty miles in an automobile through beautiful 
 meadow land tiiat I'.^s already demonstrated that it ccn raise fruit of a size, 
 color and qur-Iity siniilar to that grown at Wenatchce and North l''akima. 
 
and of superior keeping qualities. Another great advantage is that wormy 
 apples are unknown, the nights being too cold for the codling-moth. Over 
 1,000 acres of appic trees were planted this year at Ellensburg and twice 
 this number of trees have been ordered for next year. Pears, plums, cherries 
 and apricots do well and all small fruits. The strawberries rival those raised 
 at Hood River, Oregon, considered the finest in the world. 
 
 A day or two I spent at North Yakima in order to see a fully developed 
 fruit country. I talked with a number of fruit buyers who were buying for 
 the eastern markets. They were paying big prices and there was not fruit 
 enough to go around, although this valley has a record crop. Some of the 
 best orchards here have sold for $1,500 per acre. The crop I saw on many 
 of them would sell for five or six hundred dollars. The Kittitas Valley about 
 Ellensburg will become this same kind of a country when it is developed. 
 It is a wonderful fruit country. 
 
 My journey ended at Seattle. With the first glimpse of the blue water 
 of the Inlet and the scent of the Pacific beaches and the warm sunshine of 
 the Coast warming my shoulders, it was completed. From the Mississippi 
 to the lazy Pacific I had seen the Northwest, the empire of Lewis and Clark's 
 discovery a hundred years ago. It is indeed an empire, only half developed 
 as yet, but merely waiting for the men to run the irrigating ditch and the 
 plow through its sod and for transportation to carry its products to the 
 eastern markets. The men are coming: the steel rails are constantly heading 
 westward across the prairies, and the long awaited future of the Empire 
 of the Northwest is — today. 
 
 All this country described will be developed and settled by the building 
 of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway now under construction from 
 the Missouri River west of Aberdeen, crossing the river at Mobridge due west 
 of St. Paul and Minneapolis about four hundred miles, through South Dakota, 
 the southwest corner of North Dakota, through Montana for nearly 500 
 miles, through Idaho and Washington to Seattle and Tacoma. 
 
 Fuller information than it is possible to give here will be most cheerfully 
 given on application, and additional maps and pamphlets sent. 
 
 F. A. Miller, Geo. B. Haynes, 
 
 General Passenger Agent Immigration Agent 
 
 Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Ry., Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Ry., 
 
 Chicago 348 Marquette BIdg., Chicago 
 
LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS 
 
 liiiiilliilii 
 
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Conservation Resources 
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