Imperial press and farmer., November 02, 1901, Image 1

About Imperial press and farmer. (Imperial, San Diego County, Cal.) 1901-1903

Image provided by: University of California, Riverside; Riverside, CA

                
Imperial Press.
VOL. I.
THE IMPERIAL FARMER.
For olght montliH prior to Jtin««.
1 001 1 tho Iroporlal farmer wai pub*
Ijihed monthly In tho city of l*on An
r.'i'H undor the editorial manage
mont of tho undersigned, With tha
May number, tho publication of tiiiH
monthly was temporarily suspended,
and nt a lator dato an arrangement
was made to consolidate the Imperial
Farmer with tho Imperial Pross, a
weekly paper published at the new
town of Imperial; the consolidation to
take effect on the llrst of November.
1001.
This issue of the Imperial Pros* and
Farmer is the firm issuo under the
now management, with K. F. Howe In
editorial control. Mr. Howe is today
considered one of the ablest writers
In Southern California on tho re
sources of this country. It Is pro
posed to make tho Imperial Tress and
Farmer second to no other weekly
newspaper in the Slate.
All persons who have paid subscrip
tions to the Farmer In advance, will
bo served with tho Press weekly until
they have received me amount due
them at tho rato of $1.50 per year
from tho new publication in lieu of
tho old rate of $1.00 a year for the
former piiS' ; catlon.
We congratulate our late readers on
the change, believing that they will be
more than satisfied with the new pro
gram mo.
L. M. HOLT.
HOW TO GET A RANCH.
The land under the Imperial canal
system belongs to the government,
with the exception of tho sixteenth
nnd thirty-sixth sections of each town
ship, which are school lands and be
long to tho State.
Tho government lands are obtain
able elthor under the Desert Land
Laws at n cost of $1.25 pci j»tc, of
whirl) amount 25 cents in paid at the
time of filling on the land, icd the
remainder Ih payable at any time
within four years when the pettier
proven up on his claim.
The water right Is obtainable by
purchasing stork In one of the Im
perial water companies of which there
are several, each having a particular
territory to supply with water, Ail
these companies get their wa»T from
the Imperial Canal System, which is
the property of the California Devel
opment Company. The stock of nil
the companies is all sold at the samo
price and on the nnme terms. At the
present time the stock Is held at $l. r i
per share, on ensy terms of payment.
Interest on deferred payments is nt
tho rate of live per cent, per annum.
The Imperial water companies are
organ! tod on the mutual plan, and get
wnter from the Imperial Canal Sys
tem delivered at the International
boundary line, for which they pay tho
ttti in of fiO cents per acre foot which
Ih equal to about two cents per Inch
for 24-houra' flow. Tho water Ib
"Water Is King— Here Is its Kingdom/ 9
IMPERIAL, C/VL, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1901.
then delivered to HtorkholderM only an
they may order It at cost price whlcn
Ih the price paid the California Dove!'
opment Company plus tho cost of of h
trlbutlon »h<i ozpemo of keeping up
fhe distributing system.
For tho amount of water dellrercd
«nd tho certainty of Uh being deliv
ered when called for, thlH Ih thd
cheapest Irrigation water to be found
Ir. the United States at tho present
1 1 mo— and tho moHt abundant Hupply.
BTOWBLL BLOCK, LOS ANGKLKS. OFFICES OF CALIFORNIA DEVELOPMENT COMPANY,
IMPERIAL LAM) COMPANY, AM) DELTA INVESTMENT COMPANY.
THE GANGES CANAL.
Tho largest Irrigation cnnal in tho
world is said to bo the Ganges canal
in India, which is ISO feet wide and
ten feet deep, and carries 6750 cubic
feet of water per second. This is the
statement of the "National Irrlgator."
This canal was a government enter
prise.
Tho Imperial canal now being con
structed to irrigate 500.000 acres of
land In California and about 300,000 In
Lower California will consist of three
parallel canals each of which will be
sixty feet in width and ten feet deep,
or a total of 180 feet in width and ten
feet deep, tho same as the Ganges
canal.
Tho (lances canal using water on a
basis of one inch to two ncrvs— the
basis on which the Imperial canal Is
constructed— would Irrigate G75.000
acres of land, or 12'-' .OOO acres less
than the amount which will bo Irri
gated by tho Imperial canal. This
can probably lie accounted for on the
presumption that tho Imperial canal
lias a little more fall to the mile than
tho Qangcs, and honco would carry
more wuter.
AND FARMER.
Two hundred thousand arron of
land In the Halt Klver Valley, which
Ih only partially Irrigated, and hence
Is only partially productive, Is Blip
porting a population of .30,000 people,
and a move Is on foot to construct the
Tonto reservoir so as to fully reclaim
this 200,000 acres and make It support
double the population It does today.
These facts are gle&ned from th»» Ari
zona Republican, a live daily pub
lished at Phoenix in the Salt Illver
Valley. The Republican is solid in ir
rigation matters, and is doing a great
work for Arizona. If 200.000 acres of
land now partially irrigated, supports
30.U00 people, and would support 60,
: 000 when fully irrigated, what will the
'500.0 tv acres in Imperial Settlements
support, having a full water sup
ply for every acre? With one inhab
itant to every three acres, the pop
ulation of that section would be 166,
\ 000 — more people than there are to
i day in Los Angeles city and county.
| This Is no dream. It is a conservative
1 statement.
The Jaffa orange Is grown In and
around Jaffa on the Syriau Coast, and
the crop amounts annually to about
300,000 boxes. The Jaffa orange gar
den covers usually about twenty acres
on which are planted about 0000 trees
twelve feet apart each way. Tho or
ange is budded on lemon stock and
comes to maturity In six years when
the annual income is from $100 to
$125 per acre. The crop is mostly
shipped to Kußland— loss than 1000
carloads a year — about one-third tho
Ketlhuuls* crop.
NEW YORK TRIBUNE,
PHILADELPHIA PRESS
What Some of the Leading Eastern
Publications Have to Say About the
Imperial Canal System.
The New York Dally Tribune, in its
Issue of Sunday, September 19, pub
lishes an illustrated article under the
heading of "Reclaiming a Desert," In
which it says:
"The most remarkable series of Irri
gation projects ever wrought out In
the United States arc rapidly taking
form on the Colorado River, the great
est stream In the Southwest, which
carries sufficient water to irrigate
eight million acres of land. On the
California side of the river is the vast
Colorado desert. Across the Interna
tional line in Mexico, on the Peninsu
la of Lower California, the desert ex
tends to the southward. On the east
ern, or Arizona side of the river, the
desert extends from Yuma to the head
of the Gulf of California and be
yond. . .
"The greatest of the projects, how
ever, is that of the Imperial Company,
which has entered upon the gigantic
task of irrigating five hundred thou
sand acres of land in San Diego coun
ty, California, and three hundred
thousand acres in Mexico, and which
delivered its first water in June of the
present year. The water now deliver
able to the Imperial lands is sufficient
for the irrigation of more than one
hundred thousand acres, and to this
additions are being made rapidly.
Several hundred acres were planted in
June, on the arrival of water, and
fully fifty thousand acres will in all
probability be sown in alfalfa during
the coming winter.
"Before water was placed on any of
the land under this system, over
eighty thousand acres were filed on by
settlers under the Desert Land Law
and the Homestead Law, and hun
dreds of people are now rushing into
the country f anxious to take advan
tage of the opportunity held out by
the government to acquire cheap land
under the assurance of crops provided
by irrigation."
The Philadelphia Press, in its issue
of September 29, also publishes an Il
lustrated article which is headed
"Nile Dams Surpassed by Greatest Ir
rigation System in the World:"
"From the present rush into the
country, it seems probable that within
a year or so, the entire area of irri
gable lands on the delta in the United
States will be taken up. The average
holdings will be about 100 acres, im
plying that some 7500 families will
find homes on the delta within the
next year or two. . . .
"But the popular conception of a
desert is a wide expanse of light,
drifting sands. That is erroneous.
There may be drifts of sand, and there
are here, in places, banks of sand off
at the edge of the desert. But the main
floor, hundreds of thousands of acres
in extent, is not of sand, but of a sed
imentary deposit, made by the great
Colorado River, the shavings, as it
were, produced by the carving out of
the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, tho
grandest and most awful work of na
ture on* the whole broad face of tho
old earth.
"The soil Is compact, and teamß
driven over Its unbroken surface trot
along at ease. Yet It Is easily worked,
and chemists who have carefully an
alyzed It declare that it oven exceeds
in fertility tho famous soil of thu del
ta of the Nile, while tho water of tho
river, used for irrigation, carries
greater fertilizing properties than does
tho wnter of tho Nile, and a well
drilled to tho depth of 585 feet was
still In tho snmo soil when it was
abandoned."
No. 29.