Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1899-05-19

the road is rank and green. There
is no sign of wind Kill or winter
kill. The prospect is that the
irrigated field will yield thirty
bushels to the acre.
F. B. KOen is not a acOmmunica-
tive man; that is to say he is not a
man who appears to be hunting
for somebody to communicate
his plans to. He seems willing to
talk when he is questioned, but he
is no artesian, ever-fowing well
of information.
Il am willing" said he, ''that
Iyou should ask any question in re-
gard to anything except what
this will cost and where the money
is coming from
He was assured that it was a
matter of comparative indiffer-
ence as to what the enterprise
would cost or where the money
would come from; the important
thing to know was, would it work
and how much land would the
ditch and reservoir irrigate?
81 have faith in the success of
the enterprise" said Koen, as he
watched the water tumbling
through a 'lateral' and spread
ing out over the thirsty ground.
eff l hadn't faith in it you can
be sure that l wouldn't be here"
"You ask how much land can be
irrigated from the ditch and lake.
Well, it is safe to say that half a
million acres can be irrigated
without any particular trouble.
More could be, but there is no use
to say that more than half a
million acres can be irrigated, be-
cause if we Opeople will say that
we are lying about it. The canal
as you see it now is not complete.
When it is completed it will av-
erage 100 feet in width and six
feet in depth"
"Doy you think, " we asked, ssthat
you can get enough water out of
the Arkansas river to fill that
lake?"
Gill it? Why, I can fill it in one
winter
Asked if there was anything in
the report that had been started
that he was preparing to use the
underfow in his irrigated ditch,
Koen replied that he didn't con-
slider the underfow that had been
talked about so much of great
value for supplying irrigating
bitches. sit can't be utilized. ;"
said he, unless you pump it.
Mr.. KOen has what seems at
first thought a somewhat un-
reasonable theory that the more
water there is taken out of the
Arkansas river and used in ir-
rigating the country Immediately
adjacent to the river the greater
will be the flow of the stream.
His argument in support of his
theory is that the breaking
up and irrigating of this
county rwould prevent the waste
of water in floods such as now
come with a dash and are gone
without benefting the country.
The artificial lake when complete
will have accordidg to Mr.. Koen's
estimate, an average depth of 20
feet or thereabOut. There will
be places, of course, that will be
much deeper than that. The area,
as we have before stated, will be
nearly fourteen miles in length,
by more than six miles in width,
making it the largest artificial
body of water in the UnitedStates.
Where the canal empties into the
lake is a fall of nearly forty feet
which will furnish a water power
sufficient to run a large dynamo
for pumping purposes, which
suggests the possibility that when
the river gets SO low that it is no
longer navigable for even small
catfsh, the water power at the
mouth of the ditch might be used
to pump water into the ditch to
furnish more power, and SO on ad
in finitem, being a sort of perpet-
ualmOtion as it were. 1t is fair to
say that this suggestion was not
made by Mr.. Koen.
| 1t is easy to be seen that the pro-
Hector and digger of the great
| ditch is somewhat enthusiastic
| labout the lake. The primary OBJ
Iject of the lake will be to use it as
a great reservoir to store water,
to be used during the dry season
but if the plans of KOen don't
miscarry somewhere, that lrke
will be a good deal more thar
simply a storage reservoir
Hotels and boat houses will be
: built on the banks and pleasure
steamers will ply on the waters o