Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-11-30

M1SEoLA, Tex, Nov. IS, 1920.
To the Gazette.
DEAR SIR--I notice in TIE GAZETTE OF
November Is Communication from here
signed ''Mineole. - Now l agree with
"Mineola in all he says about the
country and about ribbon cane except
one thing. think the estimate that he
puts the acreage in this county of land
suitable for growing ribbon cane far too
low. 1 am what you might call en-
old settler here. have seen
thirty-one more or less successtlb
crops grown IN this county, AMI never
saw failure, aud during the thirty
one years that l have lived in Wood
county l have been practicable sur
/ veyor and have penetrated almost every
NOOK and corner of Wood county, and
l wish TO speak of another growing IN
/ dustry that is fast coming to the front
. in this county, to-wit., the growing OF
all kinds of fruit. 1t is now conceded
that East teXas is the garden
spot of the world for fruit
growing, and Wood county is the
banner county in Texas for fine fruit. /
/ wish TO state that We have III Wood
/ county the finest lands in the world for
fruit; the soil on the high lands is of
grey loan aud fue as flour, but of sharp
/ grit, 50 that the water falling on it
soahs uD and drains out through natural
drainage. the sub soil being OF q light
sandy nature too fine to permit of the
soil from the surface going down
through it, and yet porous enough
to drain out the supeCluous water that
: fall inriDU rainy :
to iniure the roots OF the fruit trees that
feed near the surface.
Until recent years our population, all
being poor. kept their attention on the
{ cotton crop thinking that the only money
! crop that was adapted 10 this country.
! Finally now ana then farmer,
after getting his land all paid
. out, began to experiment with few
! fruit trees, and others seeing his success
would fail into line until we now have
| some of the most tlouTishing fruit farms
/ In this county that are to be found any
| where on the face of the globe. l will
I only mention one. tO-wit, the Mammoth
| orchard situated one mile east of Min
| cola, in plain view of the Texas and Pa
| citic railroad, owned by S. zuckermsn of
| Chicago and that prince of big-hesrted
! East Texans l.. II. Graham of MineeIa,
who is also overseer and gensEsls4gAgsr
! of the Mammoth orehaS6kS take
pleasure in shoy4yG tsTanfs all over
s ms graham any Is,o aay 'hes s
thgs favorable spring for fruit he
5tffH be on hand with q few carloads of
early straw berries to regale and liven up
! the berry-ioving population of Chicago
and the Northwest generally from his
twelve-acre strawberry bed, and little
| later Oil from his $50 acres of
choice peach trees he can supply sew
eral carloads of fine PEACHES to revive
the furnishing appettes of the Panhandle
of Texas immigrants who have been
lured on to that great wheat country,
and still later Oh from his eighteeu-acre
Ieyard will supply carload after car
! load of the finest grapes ever grown
| California not excepted-and then II
they want an apple, sweet and juicy,
well ripe through and through, guaran-
teed to keep well anywhere in Texas all
winter, Just give him an order for few
cars.
Now we have very few fruit farms as
large as the Mammoth, but we have the
land 10 make them on thousands and
thousands of acres of it in Wood county
TO be for from So to $40 per acre, ac-
cording to proximity TO shipping facili-
lies, ana it hardly can be said that any
portion of Wood county Is far from a
railroad. We have the Texas and
Pacific traversing the whole width of the
county from east TO west. We have the
eru from the south line to
the wde-awake city of Mineola,
and from Mineola northwest We have the
Missouri, Kansas and Texas TO the Rains
county line, and then we have the East
line traversiug the northern portion of
the county two-thirds of the way from
the east to the west of the county, to
anywhere in this county is in convenient
distance to q shipping point.
Blu: Mineoln is the principal town of
county, and l wish to note just here that
no town i'll Texas can furnish set of
business men that can be more polite or
accommodating TO i'm migrants than are
the citizens of Mineola. All immigrants
coming into this county have only to show
an industrious, moving spirit 10 elicit the
appreciation Of our business men, who
have ample capital to supply every far
mer in the county with one year, ra-
tions if they need it, and all farmer
has to do is to start out in the spring as
if though he was going TO cultivate his
GRAD and he can obtain on Il credit all
99zafe supplies necessary to make his crop.
We have no failure of crops here, and
our merchants know it. Our soil is fer
tile and our seasons never desert us.
Grass, too, grows luxuriously all over
the country. Our cattle and horses now
on the range are fat, and they always
remain so up TO about February, and
will live aud do we'll until new grass
comes up in April. Though without
feed during February and March they
sometimes fall of some before the new
grass ia up sufficient to feed upon. I'm
migrants coming into this country can
always find plenty OF cleared land to
rent until they can open up a farm of
their own. Land is to be had either for
standing rent so much per acre, payable
III the fall or for part of the crop grown
nrr