The record-union., 1891-01-29
5&tiarrllnnen,1a.

iSe- VT W'lnN.fS OF HOII1e
Go to Newcastle and Colfax and PEN
ryn. Who took those apparently sterile
hills and lands long overlooked and made
them TEEN with rich and profitable
fruits? The owners of the soil did it.
Go to Thermalito and Palermo. Whose
capital, whose faith, whose pluck and
enterprise have given us the convincing
proof that we may grow oranges in this
north land? Local capital, local men
did it.
Stop at this Queen City of the North
tme-honored and tried as no town in
Christendonl has been tried and survived.
what and who are giving new life and
fresh hope and promise to your beautiful
CITY? 1t is your fruit industry and your
by their works.
60 where you will in this State-even
to the Southern om-land-and you will
see the genesis of all prosperity in the
people themselves.
Fresno, Santa Clara and Vacaville
need no proclamation from the hill top.
Men seek lands there at high prices,
while we can't give away better lands.
The whole secret lies in the demonstra-
tlon by the owners of the soil.
MI. President, 1 must speak plain the
enemies OF our region live in the region.
Inc hardest man to convince is your
neighbor. The hardest man to arouse is
the man who plumes himself ON his lene-
age back to the Argonauts of this coast.
L have known more men driven out of
the country by diScouraging criticism of
local effort than were ever held by help
full hands.
f,you want to sell man a piece of
land in Northern California you must
take him from the train at night and
cOmDiete the sale nv sIIpriSn
The point wish to emphasize is this
that 1t lies in the power of any commu-
nifty in this great valley to do just what
has been done in the places / have named,
by concerted and well-directed local
action.
Fresno who would dare suggest to
stranger that raisins cannot be profitably
grown there?
DO you suppose man in San Jose
would dare express doubt about Santa
Clara Valley for prunes, or that there is
LETT solitary Silurian in Vaca Valley?
There never was time or place where
people were doing well and making
money that other people would not come
there and invest and make homes. And
The converse almost as invariably true
that men will not go and invest and
make homes where the people are not
prosperous and where they held out in
II,
You may talk the Eastern home
seeker blind about the great profit of
frult-growing and the adaptability of
your land for fruit, but if before you talk
nm blind he sees you do not yourself
plant, he will leave you if he has to be
led away by small boy
The remedy then is in ourselves. I
might mention one other, but it is not
within our control. and therefore had
better be omitted. would state it, only
L fear it might be accepted as the only
remedy, and our people would wait for
another decade to see if it would be ap-
piled.
=, | refer to the transportation companies.
They could fill up this State, but it may
be doubted whether such "a filling up
would be half as effective and lasting as
we can ourselves accomplish.
Mr.. President, this is indeed O noble
heritage of ours-this wonderful Sacra-
mento Valley. Such sunny skies, such
fertile soil, such matchless climate are
not to be found combined outside OF Cali
fornia on the American continent. With
a just and true appreciation of these great
gifts, our people ought to be the most
prosperous and the happiest people on
earth, and we ought to have ten where
we now have one
With sixty-two million mouths to feed,
and increasing at the rate of one and one
half millions annually; in the only spot
in all this broad land where the apricot,
the prune, the almond, the raiSin, the
olive, the grape of foreign lands, the fig
of commerce, have found home, we
keep up this wretched and disheartening
agricultural ne-wheat-wheatS
wheat-better grownin the Dakotas where
the thermometer goes to 600 below zero
more profitably grown in almost any
other part of the globe than here.
A mine we have, whose ledge reaches
from Shasta to San Diego, and as broad
as the space between our great mountain
ranges, charged with gold, silver and
iron, and we persist in working the mine
for it's iron. Was there ever a people
more stupid and illogical and blind and
perversely short-sighted?
Do you suppose a Frenchman could be
induced TO dig up his five acres of vines
and exchange them for l60 acres of wheat?
Do you suppose that the Italian would
yield his little patrimony of 100 olive trees
that support his family well, and plant
wheat?
Do you suppose the Spaniard could be
induced to forgo the profits of his little
raisin patch and raise wheat at cent and
quarter pound?
Do you suppose there is in Iowa or Hi
nois farmer so dull that he would raise
corn or wheat if he could grow our de-
lightful fruits?
No! Nor will we long practice the folly
of the past.
California viii always grow wheat and
it always should grow wheat; but we
must grow wheat, not for Englishmen,
but for Americans in California 1t must
be limited to our home market and be
consumed by the millions who occupy
our soil in diversified agriculture. We
will then have our wheat belts and wheat
farms, and orchard belts and orchard
farms and the tiller of both will prosper
and grow rich, and wax fat and kick.