Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1889-09-19
MARVELLOUS SOUTH.
Best Crops 1t Ever PrOdueed-Farmers
Less in Debt than Since the War.
The Hum of Unprecedented Industrial Activity
Heard from Virginia to Texas-Tes-
timony of Bankers.
Manufacturers, Record

Brilliant beyond description is the ont
look for the South's future. The day OF
her poverty has passed, and she has now
entered upon a career Of prosperity and
activity that is indeed dazzling. The
opening season of another cotton year
finds her with crops such as never before
made glad the hearts of the tillers of her
sod. Nature has blessed the labors of her
people with almost more than they can
care for.
Fruits have brought millions of dollars
to the South this year, and still from the
bending trees that could scarce
ly carry their burden of peaches
apples and pears, hundreds of
thousands OF bushels have fallen
to rot upon the ground, because the yield
was beyond the ability of the people to
ship or consume. Such corn crop as
has been raised was never known in this
section before, surprising even the great
yield of 1888, which up to that time was
the largest ever produced in the South.
OF cotton, it is almost too soon to speak
definitely, but the yield will hardly, we
think, fall short of $50 900 TO : 500 600
bales, even taking the most conservative
estimates. Moreover, the Increased con-
sumption throughout the world has
caused a steady advance in price, and
cotton is now bringing very much higher
prices than last year. This means an
Increase in the value of the crop, added
to the increase of production of probably
not less than fifty to seyenty-tive million
dollars. The Importance of this can be
better understood when, in connection
with it it is remem bered that the crop was
raised at lower cost than any year since
the war, and that the farmers are at the
beginning of the picking season less i'll
debt than at any time since 1865.
Corn, the South next in Importance
crop, has, like cotton, given the best
yield ever secured, reaching probably
fully five hundred and fifty million bush
els, against 500 ,705, 900 bushels in 1888.
Oats, wheat, tobacco, sugar, rice, veg
etables have all done better than for
years, and it is a conservative estimate
TO place the increase in the value of all
Southern crops Of 1889 at one hundred
and twenty five million dollars to one
hundred and fifty million dollars more
than in 1888, and that, too, remember
ing that the aggregate value of last year
was the greatest on record uD 10 that
time.
Letters from leading bankers and other
business men of the South tell of de-
gree of prosperity that the Manufac-
turers' Record has for years been pre-
dieting, but that few could be made to
believe would be realized so soon. These
letters tell of immense crops, of freedom
from debts, of the abundance of money,
even now when the money crop-cotton-
has just commenced moving to market,
of the activity that is seen on every hand,
and of the life and enthusiasm which
thrill the people of the whole South.
1t needs but a moments thought 10
see the reason for this remarkable era
Of prosperity which has just opened upon
the South. In the last three and half
years the Manufacturers Record has
reported the organization in the South
Of upwards OF eleven thousand new in
dustral establishments, covering every
line OF manufacturing, from making
pins to- building locomotives, and the
building OF over eight thousand miles
Of railroad, and the production OF the
largest crops ever raised in this section,
which yielded good profits to the farm
ers. A statement of the leading crops
for 1887 and 1888 and the estimated
yield for 1889 is of interest,":