The Mena weekly star., 1897-06-16
TwENTy-EIdHT HUNDRED FEET.
Farming at That Altitude Near Mena.
 -pIace for a Summer Resort.

the Star hau the pleasure Ol NiSltihS
 Mir J,K. Holdar and family. who have
 a 320 acre farm and home on the top of
 Rich Mountain, two and half miles
 from Grand Summit, station twelve
 miles north of Mena. The farm IS di-
 rectly on top of the mountain, one
 mile long by half mile wide, the
 long way being east and west.
 MT. Holdar is an Iowa man and went
 upon this tract of land eleven years ago with his wife and five children, finding it wilderness though it had
 been partly improved and then aban- doned and left to return to state of nature
 Forty.eight years ago Archibald
 Hays settled upon the land and plant ed an orchard, but enlisted when the war began and never returned. Twen- tv years ago a man named Beecham made a settlement, built a large double log house and planted small orchard also. but was forced by the white caps" of those days to leave the coun- try. When Mr. Holdar went upon the place he, in due tune, found these or chards hid in thickets of native timber and brush, much taller than the apple and peach trees that had been planted many years before. He again cleared the land around the trees and they have never failed to bear any year since.
 Near the Beecham house where Mir. Holdar lived many years, is a stone where the government surveyors found the altitude to be 2,ss0 feet above the level of the sea, and now we see a farm with 40 acres in good cultivation possessing as rich, deep, black soil as any farm in Iowa, but not as level or free from stone. Here can be seen growing now twenty-five or thirty acres of clover and timothy fully knee high, as many acres of corn look ing remarkably well at this season, also acres of potatoes, tobacco and garden truck of all kinds are growing to perfection together with fruits of all kinds except blackberries and grapes which do not do we'll here. An other peculiar feature of this noun tain is that not stick of pine grows near the top while all other mountains near have pine growing from base to  summit Nearly all kinds of timber grows here however. All of the oaks, hickory, ash, walnut, hard and soft maple cherry, chincapin, buckeye elm, cucumber tree, elder, sassafras, lin or bass wood, etc. Numerous herbs of commercial valne grow in abundance in the woods on this noun tain, such as wahoo, ginseng, kohosh, spice-wood, lady slipper, sarsaparilla, sweet annice, etc, etc.
 There are numerous springs on the sides of this mountain near the top, some pure and soft, others being strongly tinctured with iron and said to possess great healing properties, and strange as it may appear, wells of water can be had at from eighteen to thirty feet in depth.
 These springs together with the pure atmosphere found at such an alti tude, causes many people to seek the place as a summer and health resort, and for a few months now numerous families and persons will make their camps, drink the waters from the springs and breathe the pure invigor- ating air on the top of this mountain. In fact so many people go there each season, even long prior to the building of the railroad down the valley near, that Mir Holdar and other farmers find ready market for their farm pro- duets right with these people.
 Many of the woods near the culti- vated fields have the wild raspberry. both black and yellow, growing to perfection the last years canes being loaded with fruit and this years show ing growth of seven feet in length.
 Here are all the natural elements needed to make popular summer and health resort-one that will surely at tract thousands as they learn of the cool. pure atmosphere. healing waters and the magnificent scenery open to their view upon all sides and in all di- rections.
 There is much that must be done,