The pioneer express. [volume] (Pembina, Dakota [N.D.]) 1883-1928, 1885-06-05

the following:
AN INTERVIEW.
Mr.. A. B. Little, general agent for " m.
behring's machines from Fargo north 10
the boundary line says Of the New Era
Grader:
Every few realize how much it has
done and is dong for the valley in the
way Of increasing the crops and adding
to the value Of tho lands. Tie farms in
East Grand Forks township have been
doubled in value in the last two years,
and all the other townships east, SOUTH
east and northeast of it within twenty
five miles.
Farmers talk about the extra value OF
their farms because they have coulees
running through them. Any farmer in
a township owning a New Era Grader
can have fine coulee along the entire
side of his quarter section, and make
it with one days work of the grader.
Natural coulees are crooked and cut up
the land badly; those made by the grader
are better because straight. A farmer,
whose farm las all the natural coulees
needed should still he in favor of his
township owning a grader because a
farm surrounded by other good farms
will sell for twice as much as one among
poor farms. One farmer cannot properly
drain his own farm, il must be a town.
ship job as on the east side of the river
where the roads are from twenty to thirty
miles long in straight line and the
water flows to the Red and Snake river in
the bitches the whole distance Every
ditch started should be run to an outlet.
1 do not think there is a township that
had owned a grader long enough to run
it one season that did not have an in.
creased yield for more than enough to
pay for the grader and all expense Of
making the roads and bitches. In one
case in Cass county where two sections
Of land are as near alike as peas, except
that one owner put ditch on two sides
of it at an expense OF about 500, in all
else they were treated alike, and yet tile
one ditched Yielded over six thousand
bushels more than the other. Neither
I or the house which 1 represent have
any interest in the grader. but We like
to see them sold, rs it makes more grain
to cut, more machines are wanted and
sure crops make farmers able to pay for
them. Loads of eighty bushels of wheat
can be hauled where it was almost i'm
possible to 80 with a buggy. Even the
alkali land raises good crops after a New
Era Grader has been owned year or
two. What surprises me is that it is
necessary to explain to the farmers what
great benefit it is to them to have roads
and bitches. They all seem to know
that the grader will make them very
cheap, and in fact that practically it is
the only machine that will make them
at all in the Red River Valley soil, but
are disposed to put off purchasing until
they get richer, while in fact it is the
very thing they need to make them
wealthy and prosperous. We find that
in those townships which have expended
the most money in purchasing and
running New Era Graders our collections
are the easiest, no trouble to collect
there. Our trouble comes from those
townships that think they cannot afford
to buy, and who try to save the price of
the grader and monkey around with
plows, scrapers orleyelers. They do save
indeed, they save their salt, but lose
their bacon. Penny wise, but pound
foolish.