St. Charles Republican intelligencer. (St. Charles [Charles City], Iowa) 1856-1857, 1857-05-14
35.

fall of nine feet is obtained Of the
whole body of that stream, and where
large manufacturing town must 90
built /; runs within seven miles OF lip
ton, the county seat of Cedar county,
,, penetrating the finest portion OF that
! county passes alongside Of Lisbon
3 and Mt. Vernon, two thriving towns
: in Linn county, containing a .popnla-
tion of about 5000 souls, and Mt. Ver-
non possessing a fourishing College
in one of the finest edifices in the State;
and thence, passing through a splen-
did body of timber land, reaches Ce-
dar Rapids, the largest and most prom
ising manufacturing town in Iowa.
Cedar Rapids must, at no very distant
day, assume the rank of a city of TO-
600 to 10000 inhabitants.
The entire scope of country penetra-
ted by the Chicago, Iowa and Nebras-.
ka Railroad is unsurpassed in the
West for beauty, healthfulness and
fertility. Much of it is thickly set
tied as much SO as any portion of
Iowa and now yields annually an
amount of agricultural products far
beyond the capacity af any present
mode Of transportation to market pos
sessed by the people. tbs the valley
Of the Cedar river that this road is es-
pecially designnd and calculated to de-
velop and the character of this val
ley is aptly given by David Dale Ow-
en-, U. S. Geologist, in his elaborate
report on the Northwest, when he de-
clares it to be I" the finest body of land
in North America"
1t is not believed that any road bed
in the West has been, or will be, gra-
ded for so small an amount of money
as the one under consideration. Twen-
ty miles have already been graded, un-
der contract of SO, 900 per mile, and
the remaining sixty-one miles are let
at an average of about $4,000 per
mile, which includes masonry. Total
cost of preparing the road bed for
eighty miles, $lsO,OOO. There are
many single miles of railroad in this
country which have cost as large a
sum as will grade the eighty miles Of
the Chicago, Iowa and Nebraska Rail-
road, and finish it's masonry.
Although originally planned to go
to the Missouri river, the government
bounty to four other roads traversing
Iowa westward to the Missouri, led to
the wiser policy of looking northwest
for the present destination of the Chi
cago, Iowa and Nebraska Railroad
Once in the valley of the Cedar river,
and that valley being one of the most
magnificent bodies of land in the West,
and the river yielding abundant avail
able water power, from it's mouth to
its source, it is obvious that line of
fourishing towns would be planted on
that river, and that dense population
would crowd its borders.
1t was already sufficiently proved in
the upper valley Of the Mississippi,
that roads running northwest are the
best paying roads. They serve to
make both southern and eastern con-
nections for the business of Wiscon-
sin, Northern Iowa, and Minnesota
st. Paul being situated on meridian
line, still west of Cedar Rapids, and
in a line with the valley of the Cedar
river, looking northwest, it became
the wisdom of experience to adopt the
Cedar valley line to St. Paul, as the
most important continuation of the
Chicago, Iowa and Nebraska Railroad
The surveys and location of the ex-
tension of our road, from Cedar Rap
ids up the Cedar valley to the Iowa
State line, in its progress towards ST.
Paul, have already been made, and es-
Inmates of its cost prepared by the
chief engineer.
For the continuation of the road
northward from the Iowa State line to
st. Paul and Minneapolis, Congress, at
its last session, made a munificent
grant of lands, amounting probably
to 500, 900 acres, and company has
been organized in Minnesota under the
name and style of the Minneapolis and
Cedar Valley Railroad Company, COM
posed of some Of the wealthiest and
most influential men of the Territory, :.
who, with the aid of the lands grant
ed by Congress, will be able to push
their road through to completion at
very early day Gen. Shields has
been elected President Of the Compa-
ny, Franklin Steele, Secretary, and
Hon. H. H. Sibley, Treasurer.
The line is very direct, having over
ninety per cent. Of straight line. The
line after leaving Cedar Rapids pass
es through the north part of Linn,
through Benton, Black Hawk -emer,
Chickasaw, Floyd and Mitck ,un-
ties. The country through whA e
line passes alternates between prairie
and timber, furnishing an abundance
Of good hard wood timber for the wants
of the country and the road.
At all the towns on the line, there
is large water power, embracing the
whole of Cedar river, and most of them
well improved furnishing an abun-
dance of power for all the machinery
OF the country.
ARIsrocRAcY.-In nearly every dense
ly populated community there are q
few-usually third or fourth rate In
the scale of moral or scientific attain.
mepts-who endeavor to set them
selves up as the upper crust of those
communities. Such persons do not
generally know that they are tho OBJ
jects of pity by the true, God-ordained
aristocracy Of society the aristocracy
of common sense and moral and intel
lectual worth. We have never vet
met man or woman Of trne worth
and possessed Of cultivated minds,
who were tinctured in the least with
the misery of q deluded, heaven-absn-
doned, Self-conccited aristocracy. The
lwarIn, free heart and open hand are
6 the true, intel