The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1880-01-01


were signing over and bemoaning the
wreck and ruin that fell upon Industrial
enterprises and business endeavors, we
thought it best to point to the hereafter and
the rewards which must surely follow cour-
ageous graphing with present difficulties |
and obstacles. The sagacity, the selt-re-
lance and energy Of our people,w believed,
would be equal to the emergencies, and
themselves to the necessities OF
the case, so school their habits and capaci-
ties as to work out benefits from the SEEM
ing misfortunes which hedged about us. A
people that had builded Republic of 49,
100000 inhabitants out of a wilderness,
within period little more than the span of
a human life, could not afford to stagger
and fall under the weight of q few years OF
depression and disaster. Our afluent soil,
under the smiles of Heaven, had to respond
to the well directed appliances of the hus-
bandman the skilled labor and inventive
genius of our people could not rust and die
out; our wonderful natural resources could
not forever lie dormant and the restless,
impulsive energy peculiar to people, born
under the inspiration Of freedom, could not
brook inaction and sloth. We steadily d.
rected our readers to the dawn gilmore pro-
pitious surroundings, and when others des-
ponded and sullenly brooded over ''hard
times" we sought to cheer and encourage
and inspire hope and confidence in the time
to come. Indeed, it is net our nature to
''cry over split MILK or marshal the adj
verse turns in the wheel of past fortunes
and feed upon misgivings and oubts. We
prefer to grapple, as best we can, with the
present, and look hopefully forward to the
future. The past is only profitable for in
struction, and to stimulate the forces OF
mind and body TO renewed activity to re-
claim its mistakes and improve upon its
blunders. We believe in progress in eve
rything and that we are so beneficently
constituted that by summoning our mental
and physical powers, each man and each
community, will be enabled to successfully
utilize every emergency and overcome eve
ry obstacle that interposes to the improve
ment and development of the mental, NOR
al and physical forces, so happily blended
for our comfort and advancement.
We devote large space in the VIRGIN
IAN to-day to the evidences of the reviving
prosperity Of the country, and the marvel
GUS activity which is stimulating the en-
terprises and directing the energies OF the
American people. From one end OF our
vast expanse of territory to the other, the
busy hum of industries testifes that the
latent forces of our population have been
aroused, and apparently repentant OF the
inaction and sluggishness of the past few
years. are preparing to compensate Tor the
evils thereof by extraordinary efforts in the
future. For the year 1879 our agricultural
productions have far exceeded the most ex-
travagant results, we had ever aimed to
achieve before, and as though good fortune
must ever follow brave endeavor, the mar
kets of the world are looking to our shores
for supplies. AS if some enchanting
wand had been waved over our country, the
iron industries Of the nation have sprung
into sudden and extraordinary activity, land
the blazing FORCES and furnaces tell story
of labor, enterprise and employment, that
gives assurances of home comforts and con-
tentment, where gaunt famine had reared
his hideous front. Spindles and looms ly-
ing silent, with decay impending, have
been put in motion, and busy hands and
brains are worked to the utmost capacity
to meet the renewed demands for their pro-
ducts. In every department OF mechanical
and scientific enterprise the spirit OF pro-
gress and development has invaded, and sd
admirably have the economies which enter
into them been adjusted, that our superior
| skill and workmanship shown in our taby
RIGS, have captured and are controlling the
markets of the world. Our own section
seems to have awakened to new life. The
cotton and tobacco crops were never so
abundant and remunerative manufacture
ing enterprises have received an unprece-
denied stimulus, as though a struggle were
to be engaged in to change the seat OF these
industries from the East to the South, while
the mineral resources of our country are at
tracing attention and their marvellous extent
and richness promise to revolutionize indus
trial enterprise in this respect.
We of the South should seriously study
the currents which are now setting out
from this flood tide of business revival. With
cotton as one of the staple products, and
coal and iron threading through every
Southern State climate peculiarly adapt
ed to industrial endeavor. and water courses
formed by nature for the movement of ma
chinery, we possess all the essential ele-
ments which enter into the great industries
of the world, except the capital. There is
no place on the continent where wooden
and cotton fabrics ought to be made to
greater profit than in the South, and it has
been demonstrated that in Virginia and
Alabama iron can be produced at less cost
than in any other of the iron districts OF
America.
Not only to Virginia, but the entire South is
presented the problem for consideration, as
how to invite the essential capital to util-
ize the vast resources of wealth with which
nature has endowed us. The political dis ur-
Dances and intolerance which have become
almost chronic ir many portions OF the 1ar
South, and the loose regard for State credit,
and uniform tendency to impair State
obligations, have been the causes which
have operated to keep capital and enterprise
away. A higher plane for party action,
and healthier tone topublic sentiment as
affecting both of these obstructive causes,
would go far to open the way for that CO.
operation and sympathy which would find
its manifestation in the material advance
ment of our section. 1t is true, investments
have been made in some of the mineral
properties of the South, but this has been
done in spite Of the pubic reprobatlon OF
the political methods which have been OBJ
served both as to party rights and public
credit, and were better sentiment and
more rational action inculcated and encour-
aged, great stumbling block to the pro.
| of fbn hp