The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1862-11-04
Thus there has hann

4
toward whichimmigration would be large
ly attracted. For the extraordinary in
crease in our population we are indebted
mainly, to the fertility of onr soil, and til.
healthfulness of our climate, and not tx
any special advantage of local commerce
Nor witt the State ever need any particu
lar commercial centre. Washed by The
Mississippi on one side, and the Missouri
on the other, we have natural outlets fol
our surplus productions greatly superio,
to those which Ohio had during the forty
years in which she was gradually press
ing from the eighteenth to the third rank
among the States.
RAILROADS..
Until the year 1855, We did not have a
mile OF railway in operation in the State
In June 1850 we had $50 miles, whose
construction had cost SIS, 494.6333 We
built in five years of the decade more than
one hundred more miles of Railroad than
Kentucky built during the whole period
The railroads partly completed at the
taking OF the census connected the inte-
yior OF the State with the east at five diff.
ferent points on the Mississippi river, at
two Of which freight could be passed for.
ward 10 market without breaking bulk
But we are now much more intimately
connected with the great American lail.
way system than we were, even 50 recent
ly as 1860 and it may safely be said that
FIVE years hence nearly every county in
the State will have home market OF its
own, by reason of that same system un
der the operations of which the east and
the west have become next-door neigh.
bors.
MANUFACTURES.
Our State, like the country generally,
is more agricultural than manufacturing
or commercial. Our exports of mauu
features, except lead, are m erely nominal
or were, at all events, until 1860. We
now begin to export largely Of -four and
meal. Yet in $780, our manufacturing
establishments, the productions of each
of which amounted to at least $500 ,00C
annually-for of those producing less the
census took 20 account-saye employ.
ment to an average force of 6,577 hands
consumed raw material and fuel to the
amount ofse. 500. 900, and produced Sid,
DOC, 900 worth of manufactured articles
Let US briefly look at the details
The value Of agricultural implement.
manufactured in 1850 was $l7, 900--in
1860 was *1l2, $50; of steam engines
and machinery, in 1850. &c. 200 in 1866
Sl86, 1870; of iron founding in 1850 So,
500, in 1860, Sl87, 435 value Of books
jobs and newspapers in 1850, IS, $50, in
1880, sl40,3l3; Of sawed and planed
lumber, in 1850. e47O, 100, in 1860, So,
378, 529; of -four and meal in 1850, 81, ;.
019, 448, in 1860, s6,950,949; wooden
goods, in 1857, SlIa, 454, in 1860, Sl67,.
960; value OF leather tanned, in 1850
SEA, $50, in 1850, S8l ,760; boots and
shoes, in 1850 S56, 533. in 1860, 1895,
296; furniture, in 1850, 1851 Dos, in
1860, 1857 ,49l soap and candles, none
returned in 1850, value in 1860, Sis,
470. In several of these MANUFACTURED
boots and shoes, lumber and machiner,
tho rate of increase has been muct
greater in Iowa than in any other State
and in many others greater than in mos
of the States.
FARMS AND THE PRODUCTIONS OF AGRI
| CULTURE
The number of acres of i4hproved land.
in the State in 1850, was S94, 6s2, IN OF
$3.50, 253 the number of acres of lands
unimproved, attached to the improved
lands was, in 1850, 1.9l1, 38o, and in
le60, 5,649. 1856 The cash value Of
farms in 1850 vas, s16,657. 567. and in
1860, Sll8, TAI .405; of farming nipple.
ments and machinery 81, 172,se in 1850
and %, 100, O42 in 1860. Were the facts
and figures at hand, showing the progress
of the State in agriculture annually, VIC
do not doubt that it would appear that
we have made in this most important res
pect, more substantial imp. ovements since
the financial crisis of 1857 than previous
ly thereto. Since that time thousands ol
farmers who had before been taken with
the mania of speculation, have directed
their energies to the improvement and
better cultivation of their farms, whilst
thousands of other men, who had lived
in our cities and towns, engaged 10 wild
land and corner-lot business, on capita
borrowed at cent and half 9 month fol
every dollar used, have been compelled
BY necessity TO follow in channels Of bus
mess better calculated to permanent,
improve the State. Very many of then
are already prosperous farmers, and low,
may well rejoice that. if her cities hav,
not improved SO rapidly IS the colder
dreams of 1865 indiesied, she grow
more cereals aud sends more livestock +
market by anshundred fold than when th
rage of speculation was at white heat, an,
We we're all as rich Is Croesuses, in mag