The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-07-15

n n ORE than once, in recent weeks,
M the Standard has ventured a
word or two, the aim of which
was to chide those who are too prone
to snarl at Montana's physical environ
ment or to indulge in idle whining
about the weather or to load the air
with complaints about the season.
1t is fact that, with respect to eli
mate, there is no part of the world
where, all in all, humanity is more
highly favored than are the jewellers in
Montana. The conditions would be ideal
were it not for the fact that the Mon
tana winter has the bad habit of cling
ering in the lap of spring" The truth
is that the typical springtide, with its
beauty and its joys, essentially is lack
ing in Montana. We have superb sum-
mer days, an Indian summer that car
ries us well along toward the holidays
and bracing winter commonly not too
cold. But winter sets in at a late day,
and it tarries tediously long.
With the result that what is usually
regarded as the late spring is, in Mon
tana, joyless season of complaint and
protest and unhappiness about Montana
weather. The transcontinental trains
suffer in their thousands of miles of
transit several hours of Interruptions
the big public grumbles. The mails are
delayed; everybody frets. Washouts
put travel under temporary embargo;
young and old get i'll natured Cool days
and late frosts keep the people bundled
in winter wear; the merchants sigh.
This is carrying ingratitude unfairly
far-recently the Standard has illus
trated this fact by pointing to the
moral taught by cyclones, hurricanes,
floods, unreasonable heat and the ply
steal devastation with which many sec
tions of our country have been visited
within ninety days. Still more recently
Texts has been put in evidence as to
the result of disastrous floods Informa-
ton given out a few days ago by the
private secretary of Governor Sayers
and published in New York accounts
for fiood-swept district 1926 miles long,
with an average width of ten miles of
stances the water covered rich agricul-
tural land to a depth utterly disastrous
to crops. The total of flooded land runs
into millions of acres: the total dam
age is estimated at $40 OO0, OO0 and it is
insisted that this figure is conservative.
1t is found that, estimating the cotton
yield at only one bale per acre and the
value of each bale at $40. and calcula.-
ing that only one-twentieth of the in
undated district was planted in cotton,
the loss from that source alone will be
500 900. 00O
Consider this loss. 1t is ten mil
lions more, on the basis of the recent
valuation, than the total assessment of
real and personal property in Silver
Bow county. 1t would wipe out Cas-
cade county, on the basis of assessed
valuation, more than three times over.
1t is a total millions more than double
the assessed valuation of Lewis and
Clarke county. Indeed, if this Texas
loss proves to be only thirty per cent
of what it is now figured, it would still
be the equivalent of the wiping out of
all Eastern Montana, real and per-
sonal, on the assessed valuation-Yel-
lowstone county at about five millions,
Park county at three and one-half mil.
lions, Custer at six millions, and so
through the list.
The record is that, after a winter of
heavy SHOWS, Montana was spared, be-
cause of its tardy sprin gti1e tho VIC
itation of floods that otherwise would
have threatened. We were distinctly
favored; but the more enduring item is
that, practically, We are permanently
defended against havoc on the devas-
tatng scale that is the fate of many
other sections; our environs are pecul-
iarly favorable.