Idaho County free press. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho Territory) 1886-current, 1888-05-11

he Tafy's the Free Press Whoops Vi
Camas Prairie, and Says A Good Word Il
Behalf of the Despised Hog.
CorroNwooD, l. T., May 5. 1888.
EDITOR PRESS IL am reader of youl
paper, and / like it so well that intent
to become regular subscriber as soor
as | can see my way to pay for it.
like your way of hammering out the
golden nuggets of truth when you write
the productiveness of Camas prairie and
the opportunities it puts in the way oi
energetic persons to get a good home
with the least possible outlay Of time,
money and labor. Your advice to the
farmers to raise plenty of produce is
alone worth many times the subscrip-
ton to your paper, but some of my nei.
bors are grieved to think that you know
how to run their farms 80 as to make
some money, which is more than they
know themselves. But your sugges-
tions are most always good, but it is too
hard work to carry them out, and its
easier to sit around and play seven-up.,
l have my eye as think Of this upon
an old man who came here five years
ago with large family and no money,
and took up homestead. Single hand.
ed he has built up comfortable home
for himself and his family. He is out
of debt, and he has plenty of wheat and
oats in his granary, plenty of timothy
hay to sell, and his few cows, horses and
hogs are fat. Where will you ind such
a country anywhere else on this great
green footstool, where the labor of one
old man will support a family of six
persons, and in five years secure and
stock a good improved farm of 100 acres?
Some of our farmers say they are dis
couraged because we have no markets.
and want to sell out and leave the coun.
try. But you will always find out they
never had a surplus. They buy their
such as flour and meat on
credit, and they are always in debt to
the stores and saloons. The reason wby
these farmers cannot find market is
because they never have got anything
to sell. Where can these dissatisfied
individuals better themselves? Wages
are good here and labor always brings
sure return. Poverty is an unfortu-
nate condition, but it is the portion of
many, and poor man cannot live in
any country but by the sweat of his
brow. Any man who sells his land on
Camas prairie now in fit of despond-
ency and pulls up his stakes will live to
be sorry for it. He is making a great
blunder, and if he is the father OF a
family their destitution may disturb his
rest in the "potter's field"
Everybody comes here expecting to
20 into the stock business. Why 80 few
really do follow it is a mystery. Cattle.
horses and hogs, even at present prices.
ire more profitable than grain raising.
one bushel of wheat properly fed to +
logs will make 124 pounds of dressed
oork. AT six cents pound for the
neat, wheat fed to hogs will bring rs
'ents bushel. BY curing the meat and
'elling it at the customary prices for
bacon the wheat would be made to bring
dollar a bushel. Some farmers say
hat this is book farming, and can't be
made to work that way when put into
practice. But successful farmers in
'lenty on Camas prairie are doing it
very year. The store keepers tell me
hat they import Chicag bacon and lard
very year, because there is not enough
aised here to supply their local trade
have heard that the storekeepers do
lot pay cash prices for home bacon, but
t appears to me that they do not care
o handle that class of goods only for
he accommodation of their customers,
md if our farmers would more generally
% into hog raising and bacon curing,
hey could sell the product to their nei-
'ors, the miners and the Cinnamon, at
irst hand, and be Independent of the
1t ought to be made fel-
my for farmer to buy foreign bacon
II country like this, where nature has
,iven us such rich and abundant hog
ood as Camas prairie has.
Yours truly,
CoTTONWooD