Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-12-02
MINEOLA.
4 Resident OF Thirty-One Years in
Wood County Gives Some Facts.
The Garden spot OF the World for Fruit Grow.
ing-Mineola The Principal Town
Of the County.
MISEoLA, Tex, Nov. %, 1890.

! To the Gazette.
DEAR SIR notice in THE GAZETTE OF
November l6 q communication from here
signed ssMineola. 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
suita BILE for growing ribbon cane far too
low. 1 am what you might call an
old settler here. l have seen
| thirty-one more or less successful
crops grown in this county, sni never
| saw a failure, and 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
| ! wish to speak of another growing ln-
| 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 Eas, exas 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 in Wood
county the finest lands in the world for
| fruit; the soil on the high lands is of
grey loan aud fine as flour, but of sharp
| grit, 80 that the water falling on il
soaks up and drains out through natural
drainage, the sub soil being of 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 superfuous water that
may fall during rainy seasons, so as not
TO njure 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 to this country.
Finally now and then O farmer,
after getting his land all paid
out, began to experiment with few
fruit trees, and others seeing his success
would fall into line until We now have
some of the most fourisbing fruit, farms
In this county that are to be found any
where OH the face of the globe. "a will
only mention one, to-wit, the Matamoth
orchard situated one mile east Mn
cola, in plain view of the Texas3nd Pa
ctic railroad, owned by s. Zucl rman of
Chirago and that prince of IL hearted
East Texans L X. Graham Oh Mineola.
who is also overseer and geuelh manager
Of the Mammoth orchard, id will take
pleasure in showing immis(fnts all over
his orchard and berry faru Amy day they
call on him. MIR. Grahh informs me
that with a favorable spgt4g for fruit he
will be on hand with al Jew carloads of
early Strawberries to ri ale ana Iiven up
the berry-ioving pop,s etion Of Chicago
and the Northwest Generally from his
twelve-acre s,rsw bel b bed, and little
later on froga u $50 acres of
choice peach fres he can supply sew
eral carloads off lie PEACHES to revive
the furnishing arm lites of the Panhandle
of Texas imrng ents who have been
lured on to ths xreat wheat country,
and still later o9 from his eighteen acre
neyard will &ppfy carload after car
load of the ID Est grapes ever grown
California nj excepted-and then if
they want ID apple .ssweet and juicy,
well rips thfSugh and through, guGran-
teed to keep we'll anywhere in Texas all
winter, just give him al order fer few
cars.
Now we have very few fruit farms as
large Us the Mammoth, but we have the
laud 10 make them on thousands and
thousands of acres OF il in Wood county
to be for from So to $40 per acre, ac-
cordiug 10 proximity to shipping facili-
ties. ana it hurdly can be SAID that any
portion of Wood county lie far from a
railrnad. We have the Texas and
Pacific traversing the whole width of the
county from east to west We have the
International and Great North
ern from the south line to
the wide-awake CITY of Nineola,
and from Mineola northwest we have the
nd To- h, D,iy
county line, and then we have the East
line traversing 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 a shipping point.
But Mineola Is the principal town of
county, and l wish to note just here that
no town in Texas can furnish a set of
business men thar can be more polite or
accommodating to immigrants than are
the citizens of Mineola. All immigrants
coming into this county have only to show
an industrious, moving spirit TO elicit the
appreciation of our business men, who
have ample capital to supply every far
mer in the county with one years ra-
tons if they need 1t, and all farmer
has to do is to start out in the spring as
If though he was going TO cultivate his
crop and he can obtain on q credit all
the supplies necessary TO make his crop.
We have no failure of crops here, and
our merchants know it. Onr soil is fer
tile and our seasons never desert Us.
Grass, too, grows luxuriously all over
the country. Our cattle aud horses now
on the range are fat, and thev always
remain SO up TO about February, and
will live and do well until new grass
comes up in April. Though without
feed during February and March they
sometimes fall off some before the new
grass is up sufficient to feed upon. lm-
migrants coming into this country can
always find plenty of cleared land to
rent until they can open up farm of
their own. Land Is TO bs had either for
standing rent so much per acre, payable
in the fall or for part of the crop grown
on the land. OLD SETTLER.
Death of an Electric Linemau.