Imperial Press.
VOL. 11.
PILLSBURY'S PESSIMISTIC PUZZLING PROBLEM
The San Joaquin Valley Editor makes Statements Re=
garding the Development of California that are
not Borne out by the Facts, His State=
ments and Comments Thereon.
A. J. Pillsbury, of the Tulare Regis
ter, one of the brightest and ablest
writers in this State, recently read
a paper before the San Joaquin Val
ley Commercial Association that con
tained from a San Joaquin Valley
point of view some very plain state
ments that are probably true —he
ought to know — but in treating the
subject in a general way he misleads
the general reader by stating for
facts propositions that cannot be veri
fied.
We publish the following extract
from! his paper for the purpose of
presenting the case fairly to our
readers and for the further purpose
of making such comments thereon
as we think justified and then leav
ing the reader to draw his own con
clusions. Mr. Pillsbury- introduced
his paper with the following state
ments:
It is no small task to make a coun
try. We have given great glory to
the hardihood of the American pio
neers who ventured into forests and
out upon the prairies to rear common
wealths for succeeding generations to
occupy In peace and under the pro
tection of law, and the pioneers of
other days were well entitled to all
the praise they received, and yet, the
conditions confronted by the pioneers
from the Missouri River to the At
lantic Ocean were easy compared with
the conditions Imposed by nature upon
husbandry in all that empire lying
between the Missouri River and the
Pacific Ocean. It was no small task
to carve out of the luxurious eastern
half of the continent that empire
which now practically comprises the
potential part of the United States of
AND FARMER
"Water is King— Here is its Kingdom."
IMPERIAL, CAL, SATURDAY, JUNE 7, 1902.
America, but that task was as nothing
to the mighty work of making, west
of the Missouri, a companion civili
zation, fit to compare in wealth and
population to the one our fathers
reared east of that stream, which,
roughly speaking, divides arid Amer
ica from humid America. East of
the Missouri the farmer had only to
put the seeds into the ground and
keep the weeds down to be reason
ably sure of a crop. West of the
Missouri if the farmer ceased his
efforts when he put his seeds into
the ground, he stood three chances of
scoring a failure to two chances of
DROP IN THE MAIN CANAL OP IMPERIAL WATER COMPANY NO. 1.
raising a crop. East of the Missouri
the pioneer has to reclaim swamps,
drain marshes, fell forests and wallow
through mud. West of the Missouri
we have to water deserts, plant trees
and coax them to grow with water
and tramp through dust that mellows
our roads like plowed fields. The
conditions on the western half of this
continent are the reverse of those on
the eastern. Our fathers drained
their lands, we must irrigate ours.
They fought against a native fecun
dity that well nigh buried them be
neath a growth of vegetation. We
must fight an aridity that makes
profitable production a puzzling prob
lem.
The statement that it was easier
to carve out an empire in that portion
of our country located east of the
Missouri River than it is now, to
populate that portion west of that
river, is the first proposition that
challenges attention and to which the
Press takes exceptions.
It is true that a small portion of
our country located to the east of
the Missouri River was composed of
a fertile prairie that was easily
brought under cultivation. But how
about' that timbered and stony coun
try that covered the greater portion
of that great area?
The writer was raised in the tim
bered country of Michigan among its
lakes and swamps. It took a gen
eration to clear up that land and
make it fit for the habitation of man,
during which time he was the con
stant victim of chills and fevers, for
malaria was abundant and quinine
was a common article of diet. And
then what did they have to show for
their labor when the land was finally
cleared? The land was worn out; it
never had much depth of soil; the
constant rains and snows had
leached and is still leaching out of
the soil the little fertility it naturally
possessed. And the work of enrich
ing the soil so as to make it of any
value from an agricultural point of
view was a necessity before the
stumps had been rotted from the
field; and by the time those stumps
were out of the way the young men
who had spent a lifetime clearing up
an eighty-acre tract of land found
that he was ready to cease his labors
in this world, leaving his children to i
divide between themselves a mort
gaged farm on which the improve- i
ments were by no means of a luxur- ;
ious character. But the children were
not as poor as the reader might
naturally suppose, for they were
usually not encumbered with more
than ten or twenty acres each.
During that lifetime that family
had lived in poverty with only the
necessities of life and with very few
of the luxuries.
This was a fair sample of the con
dition of the men who built the em
pire east of the Missouri River.
Then what about the productions?
Think of that climate! — as one man
expressed it regarding the State of
Minnesota — "Nine months of very
cold winter and three months very
late in the Fall."
How much wheat did they raise to
the acre? Fifteen bushels to the
acre? Not on the average. What
was the price? Fifty cents a bushel?
Yes, sometimes, and sometimes much
l ess — especially during the times of
empire building.
East of the Missouri River, all a
man had to do, according to Pills
bury, was to put the seed in the
ground and keep the weeds down to
be reasonably sure of a crop. Did
not those crops run the gauntlet of
the season — too much cold — too much
heat — too much rain — too little rain —
too much msect — too much cyclone?
What about the winters? Did not
the farmer east of the Missouri River
have to work like a slave ail summer
In order to make provision for keep
ing his family and his stock all win
ter?
How much did it cost to cut down
the timber, clear off the rubbish, dig
out the stumps and get a clear field
in which to raise a crop with any
degree of comfort or profit? It cost
a lifetime of hard work — whatever
that might be worth. Did not the
farmer have to drain his wet lands so
No. 8