The St. Cloud journal. [volume] (St. Cloud, Minn.) 1866-1876, 1872-02-01
MINNESOTA.
BY HON. SCHUYLER CoLPAx.
Viee P+esident Of the Unit<d Statee.

| BY HON. SCHUYLER CoLPAx.
Vice President Of the Uait<d Sta,es.
From the Ne~ York Independent.
Earth and air and sky unite in as.
suripg magnificent future for this
young and vigorous State OF the North
west. Millions OF acre. of her rich soil
have been brought under cultivation
within few years. But millions aud
millions more some of them as fertile
as the valley Of the Nile, are wai,ing
for tho husbandman. Its atmosphere is
electric, making its reputation as
sanitarium for the invalid, worldwide.
And its bright winter days, full Of sun
shine and magnetism, and comparative
i free FROM damp and wind, render the
low temperature of its coolest days less
severe in its rigor than higher winter
temperature at the scaboard.
Twelve years ago, When its popula-
tion but slightly exceeded 100000.
and its cultivated area was but 345, 900
acres, when it imported food from other
States and had scarcely = million of
dollars invested in manufactures, the
writer hereof, IN a political canvass,
visited its various towns and settle
meuts, from Winona, as far north ss
Little Falls, on the Mississippi River,
besides many points in the interior.
Two years before the financial crash of
1857 had destroyed almost all values
in the new State ; paralyzed land spec
ulatiop, by which thousands had sup
posed they were amassiug fortunes !;
stopped the tide of immigration, which
had been relied on so surely as the
source of wealth and the foundation of
prosperity; driven and fortune-hunters
to hard labor, as the only means of keep.
ing the wolf OF starvation from their
doors. But this sudden check, the dis
astrous reverse, as it seemed, was a
blessing in disguise, for State as we'll as
people. The cessation of land specula-
tion saved the lands for the actual set
tier, under the Homestead Act, which
so soon thereafter became a law and
out Of Minnesota's fifty.one million
acres-ot which thirteen million have
been granted to schools, railroads, etc.,
and twelve millions are in the hands of
private owners-twenty six million,
over one half Of its whole area, wait for
the landlsss and poor Of our own land,
as we'll as others, to take possession of,
and to build for themselves and their
posterity, as the reward of that industry
which deveiopes the resources Of our
magnificent domain.
l returned from that most delightful
tour, through what had been to me pre-
v'ously terra tncognita, with enthusi-
astlc ideas as to the growth, prosperity,
Vigor, and upward and onward progress
OF State whose citizens, however, felt
so desponding aud almost hopeless.
Arrested in an unhealthy and iotoxi-
eating era of speculation by the stag
gcriog blows of a financial disaster
that deprecated property seventy-6ve
per cent. in month, and drove out Of
circulation the money with which it
might bo purchased, even at such
figures, the only resources were the
plo" and the water-wheel, agricultural
and manufacturing industry and to
these sure creators of wealth tue popu.
lation turned. With nearly two mil
lion of acres under cultivation, an in
crease. of 600 per cent iu these twelve
years, yielding eighteen million bush.
els Of wheat, ten million Of oats, FIVE
million of corn, one and half million
OF potatoes, aud six and half million
of butter; and with twelve million
dollars invested in manufactures, with
an annual product of twenty-thres
millions in value, the advance has
been as marvellous as it is gratifying.
Last Summer I vent back again to
this attractive State, neither as a can
vasser nor pleasure.seeker, but in
quest Of hea]th-to test, in fact, what
We had all heard Of so much, as to its
recuperative and reiuvigorating effects
on invalids. l found what sought
vigorous health, elastic step, buoyant
spirits. But few facts and figures
may show that there were other and
substantial reasons for rejoicing over
the healthful advancement of the State
IN all the elements Of genuine prosper
lty and enduring wealth.
In 1859 there was not mile of rail-
road in Minnesota. Last sumner there
we're fully thirteen hundred miles. Now
there are over fifteen hundred. By
next fall there will be over two thous.
and and then there will be scarcely
half dozen counties out of the fifty
odd in the State not touched by this
wiselv-orgauized railroad system: St.
Paul and Minneapolis, business rivals,
as such active cities must be when only
halfa dozen miles apart, yet indissol-
ubly bound together by the ties of in-
terest, form the center of this system,
while IN nine different directions rail.
roads radiate from this hub. A hun
dred and twenty miles to the northward
the North Pacific Railroad sweeps
across the State from Duluth, at the
head of the Great Lakes, to the Red
River of the North, and thence onward
tO the Pacific AI,oodv rho mnnou h,c