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THE RANCH
ONE
DOLLAR
A YEAR.
WEEKLY.
A Journal of The Land and The Home in The New West.
VOL. 1. NO. 17.
raOSJPEOTS.
Men of ideas and men of action
make the world think. Men of ideas
and of action make the world move.
Men who think vigorously and act
broadly, who know the world is theirs
so far as they act upon it with their
might, are the grandest product of civ
ilization. They do not lie down su
pinely when hard times come and join
the calamity howlers in their waitings.
They shut their jaws together firmly
and work the harder to accomplish their
purposes. They are not narrow-mind-
Ed, selfish creatures who squeal at
every pinching- and think that success
means only the g-etting- of dollars.
Money and its wise expenditure is es
sential to their success, but they spend
freely and broadly, seeking- the ulti
mate good, not the present 2 per cent.
Conspicuous among- such men in our
western country are those who have
carried through these great irrigation
enterprises in the face of hard times
and the croaker's constant predictions
of failure. All honor to Paul Schulze
and his heroic fight in maintaining the
Sunnyside proposition; to Fred R.
Reed and Dr. Van Marter in their
broad building for the future at Pros
ser, and toC. H. Leadbetter in his fast
developing enterprise in face of dyna
mite and depression.
What will the Yakima valley pro
duce? That is a question that will
about exhatist the alphabet to answer.
Just as a starter, here is a partial list:
Fruits, from apples and apricots to
prunes, flgs, raisin grapes, and all the
gaps between; our winter apples are
the finest and best in America; hops,
2,000 to 3,000 pounds per acre; pepper
mint, castor bean, lavendar; corn, 80
bushels per acre, though the nights
are rather cool for it; wheat, oats and
barley in perfection, 100 bushels of
oats and 60 of wheat and barley are
possible; hemp, jute and flax; cran
berries in irrigation have perfect con
ditions for culture; peanuts and sweet
potatoes; our melons vie with the
Georgians, and the valley melon patch
controls the markets of the Sound cit
ies and of Montana and Idaho mining
towns; Yakima potatoes, grown in this
irrigated, ash-bed soil, bring $2 and $4
per ton more on the Sound than the
west coast and California spuds; they
yield 27 per cent, of starch and can be
PROSSER FALLS SPECIAL.
MAY 12, 1894.
profitably grown at 25 cents a bushel;
alfalfa, 4 to 10 tons per acre, profitable
at $4 a ton; dairy products, egg's, poul
try; horses, cattle, sheep and swine—
the mild winters, matchless grazing
on the hills, and cheap alfalfa in the
valleys, make stock breeding of any
sort —any high-grade sort —highly re
munerative. Let's see; what is left
out? O, vegetables. Well, need we
say now that all garden vegetabls
flourish here? also that seed growing
will be one of our industries when
experienced seed growers come?
Facts, all through.
The Pennsylvania state board of
agriculture has collected some very in
teresting statistics about farm mort
gages in that state. During the past
ten years nearly 89 per cent, of these
mortgages bore interest at 6 per cent.,
and only 11 per cent, at less than this
rate. Twelve per cent, of the mort
gages were for sums less than $500; 28
per cent, were for sums between $1,000
and $5,000. An average of very nearly
6 per cent, interest is for these times
more than eastern farmers ought to
pay. There are in all the large money
centers large sums in savings banks
which only give their owners 4 per
cent., and in some places less than
that. It ought to be possible to bor
row money on well-improved farms for
a term of years at 4>£ per cent. What
is needed is to bring farmers into com
munication with depositors in the sav
ings banks. The result would prove a
benefit to both parties.
Thing's close at hand obscure the
view of distant glories. The Yakima
valley under irrigation is so magnific
ent a prospect that most observers
only take in the lower levels. Indeed,
comparatively few men yet see its pos
sibilities in their fullness. But be
yond the 100,000 acres, more or less,
now under the ditches —of which not
over 20,000 acres are in full produc
tion, and yet have made the valley so
prosperous and so famous —there is
easily another 100,000 acres in the
Moxee and other radiating" valleys
from the Yakima, an 150,000 under
the proposed High Line canal above
the Sunnyside, an 125,000 under the
Leadbetter, an 150,000 to 200,000 on the
lower levels of the reservation, all to
be irrigated in due time and peopled by
teeming thousands. But come up
higher; come up higher. In the vast
expanses of the Horse heaven we have
another climate, with eight inches
more of rain, 1,000 feet of greater al
titude —and some 500,000 acres of fer
tile lands, most of them capable of ir
rigation in some way; perhaps by
long canals from the Cascade moun
tains. The uplands will produce the
grains, the beef and mutton, the
horses and fine cattle, sheep and swine.
The valleys the fruits and fibers, hops
and osiers, seeds and essential oils,
and alfalfa to fatten the cattle on when
they come into the valley in winter to
be finished for market. Small wonder
that Prosser is proud of her position
as the nearest railroad town for the
Horse Heaven country. Small wonder
that all Yakima looks forward with
confidence, when we reflect that the
comparatively small areas now in cul
tivation have brought so much of pros
perity that this country is attracting
attention all over America and from
Europe as well.
* * *
Have Ranch readers who are breed
ers of horses, whether on range or
small ranch, reflected upon the real
causes of the depression in prices?
We mean those causes lying outside of
the general financial depression of the
country. Chief of these influences is
overproduction, of course, but why the
overproduction? We cannot see that
the multiplication of horses has any
more than kept pace with the growth
of the country in population and gen
eral development. Hence if matters
had kept along in the old way no over
production would be noticeable. The
trouble lies in other directions, the
most important of which is a decreased
demand for horse power. A few years
ago all the large cities > of the country
were using thousands of horses upon
their street railways. The grip car
and the electric car — steam and elec
tricity, have driven the horse from the
railway business. The omnibus horse
has been sidetracked in the same way.
The steam railways have multiplied in
all directions, and wagon freighting,
except in rare cases, has been forced
from the road. Out into the farming
districts of the eastern and middle
states the electric freight cars are do
ing the common hauling from farm to
depot. On the farms the gang plow,
the threshing machine and other labor
savers have lessened the amount of la-
* *
THE
TRUTH
IS
ENOUGH
Copyrighted 1894.
ISy Ynklma Pub.Co.
