The comet. (Johnson City, Tenn.) 1884-1916, 1890-05-08
MAPLE WOOD.

O1NOORetAS OdiJ OCAle 1ACdOCs Dc1lt
Meade's fame, however, comes from
sixty years of nursing, and with un
: limited money, skill and experience
Maple Wood is the work of few years
by single young man, q young mar
who didn't inherit dollar, but on the
contrary has done much in taking
care of and relieving the wants o.
others. He not only made the money
on which to build, but when he en-
barked in it was entirely without skill
and experience in farming and stock.
raising, though he was raised on q
farm.
Mr.. Jere Baxter has made Maple
Wood, as he has done everything he
has undertaken since boy, that is,
with judgment and dispatch, and with
a success that has made the people of
Tennessee feel that into their midst
has come a man who in business af-
fairs moves men and things the same
as Napoleon moved men and things
in war.
First, and when a boy, he walked
over much of Europe and saw more
in few months than most men see
in as many years. Then he became
journalist then, and without it be-
ing known that he had ever read law
as a reporter appointed by the Su-
preme Court, he made law-boeks, and
his law reports, nine volumes in ali,
are in every lawyers Office in the
State. Unaided he put the new and
promising town of Sheffield on its
feet. Then he took hold of the Mem
phis and Charleston Railroad, one Of
the largest corporations in the South,
gave it life, and put it in the hands of
live men. His attention was then
turned to making Nashville improve
ments, and the Baxter Block and
Baxter Court are monuments of his
enterprise. !
In the meantime Jere Baxter has
made his mark on Wall street, and
such has been his judgment that near
ly all his New York specHlations have
been successful. But from the jour
nalist, the traveller, the lawyer, the
bookmaker, the house builder, the
railroad magnate, the Wall street
speculator-in fact, from life of sue
cesses in the great business world,
which no ether young man in the
South has approached-Mr. Baxter |
has tnrned away and into what? In |
to that grand business of farming and |
stock-raising, and in a few years he
has put Maple Wood where it ranks
among the finest stock farms in the
United States. II is doubtful if any
man in the country has done as much
in tho same length of time, and time
will prove that he can also make a
success of breeding horses suited for
either track or road, and that in blood
lines that equal the productions of
Kentucky.
Mr.. Baxter has more than fourteen
hundred acres in grass, and this year
cut the largest amount of hay ever
cut from one farm in Tennessee. The
whole estate is as beautiful as gar
den. The Improvements, especially
the barns, stables and fences, to say
nothing of the residence and adjacent
buildings, would attract attention In
any part of the United States. At
Maple Wood is the largest herd of
Holstein cattle in the South, and this
year the sale of trotting horses, Hol-
stein and Jersey cattle was the largest
aver made in the State. He also
keeps an agent in Scotland buying
Shetland, Welsh and Oxmore ponies
or his farm. This magnificent VEN
.ure is managed on entirely business
principles, and if Mr. Baxter lives
ew years-and he is yet several years
lnder forty-Maple Wood will be far
ahead of any stock farm in the South,
md probably in the United States
ar, in truth, Baxter has bigger and
oolder ideas than any man IN the
business.
The gratifying feature of the great
work Mr.. Baxter is doing at Maple
Wood bears the stamp OF progress,
and that is needed more than any
hing else in the South. He has set
noble example for young men. A
man who has shown himself capable
of doing anything success when
ever he touches business of any kind,
4 man of culture Che is an extensive
commanding presence, gen.
and pleasant in his manners,
and adapted in every way to the high
est enjoyment of social life, comes
back to the farm-the business of his
ancestors-and puts his money into it
by the hundred thousand.
Such an example should encourage
beginners and stimulate the farming
and stock-raising interests throughout
the South, and more especially in
where nature with lavish
hand has spread her gifts over beau
tiful country, and where the land re-
quires but little toll to reward the az
riculturist with boHntiful haryest.
What is needed, and what has been
needed in the South more thar any
thing else, is that farming shall be
made more attractive to the young
men. That new life shall be infused
into tilling the soil, charm given to