People's voice., 1900-06-21
IN THE KANSAS GOLD BELT
Summers Greatest Season In Its History
The Crop Will Bring Over 3 IL Millions.

lle SIOp WIN Oiin6 WV
The following is the Stars wrIJe'up
of the Sumner county wheat crop,
which appeared in Saturdays issue;
There will be fOrJuUe for the farm
ers of Sumner county In the wheat
crop that is harvesting. More wheat
is raised in this county than in any
other county in Kansas. +. ID. CO6urn,
secretary of the Kansas state board OF
agriculture, reports that there are
296,SO2 acres Of wheat in Sumner
county. A reporter for the Star drove
this week through most OF the town
ships of the county and talked with
the Leading farmers to get fair idea
of what the yield will be, and what
This enormous acreage Of wheat means
In dollars and cents.
The soft May wheat has been cut
aud Is in shock waiting to be thTeShe0'
Tne harvesting Of the hard wheat has
begun and is well uuder way over all
the county. Although none OF the
wheat has been threShed so as TO
show exactly what tie yield is, yet it
is an easy matter for men experienced
in wheat growing To estimate the
yield of any particular field by going
into it and examining the ripened
wheat standing and in shock. Farm
ers who have made a business of grow
lug wheat for twenty years aud longer
can 20 into field when it is cutting
and Can estimate the yield per acre
within two or three bushels. 1t Is
men of this class throughout the
county who have been interviewed,
with the following result:
The average yield throughout the
county, at the most conservative eStl-
mate, will be twenty bushels to the
acre. There are thousands and th0us-
ands of fields that will yield twenty
five and thirty bushels TO the acre,
and a great many that will yield
thirty five and forty bushels to the
acre. Many implement men, hall
insurance men, loan agents and tarm-
ers estimate the average yield
throughout the county at twenty-five
bushels to the acre. But taking into
account the hail storm last week,
which ruined One.third Of tbe wheat
on 1000 acres iD Eden township, and
taking into account the poorest sec
tion Of the county, the opinions OF
the best and most conservative ex-
perts are that the average yield will
be 1886, ,040 bushels Of wheat TO be
marketed in Sumner county, and 1t is
a wheat that will weigh up well; the
kernels are unusually full and round
and of good length. No one here ex-
poets to yet less than sixty cents a
bushel for wheat and most people
think it will 90 to seventy-hve cents.
But If all the wheat in the county
was sold for sixty cents a bushel that
is 81, ,531, 624 that will come into this
county this year for wheat alone, to
say nothing of the corn and oats
crops that are unusually large and Of
good yield this year.
1t is the greatest wheat crop that
ever grew in this county and it is the
greatest yield per acre ever known
here since 1892, when the average
yield throughout the county was
twenty seven and One-half bushels to
the acre. In that year nearly 4 mil
lion bushels were marketed in this
county. The yield this year is ahead of
that of 1897, when 45S5,O6O bushels of
wheat were raised and sold for 81 and
as high as Sl,23 bushel.
This enormous yield Of wheat means
a continuation Of the unbOunded
prosperity that has prevailed in this
county the last ten years. Gre; t
fortunes have been made in wheat
growing in this county. Over all the
county are farmers and others who
came here poor and have grown rich
from the profits Of wheat growing.
A. Fl. Barnes of Oxford township
came here sixteen years ago and
bought 800 acres Of land and began
raising wheat. Since then he has
bought and paid cash for nine quar-
ter sections OF land of l60 acres
each, making 1,76O acres OF the finest
wheat laud that he owns, He does
not 1--WE a dollar and he said to-day:
II have just as much money, be-
sides the land, as | had when l started
out sixteen years ago."
He has $40 acres in wheat this
year and it will average twenty-five
bushels to the acre.
In 1876, when the graSShOppers ate
every green growing thing in the
county, and most of tue farmers pulled
up stakes and moved away diSguSted
with southern Kansas, Ben MiSSildine
did not 20 because he was SO poor that
he could not get away. He stayed in
Sumner county because he had to aud
he lives now where he did then, three
aud One-half miles south of Oxford.
But he is better off now than he was
then. He began raising wheat and
he owns now five quarter sections Of
l60 acres each that he would not sell
for S25, coo cash. He recently paid the
widow Smith $500 for $50 acres.
He is worth at the least $4,000 aud
he made it in raising wheat.
John Dunn, an EUglishman, came
to Oxford township twenty years ago
and paid all the money he had for leo
acres in the Arkansas river bottoms.
He has SIS, 900 loaned throughout the
County. He recently told his banker
in Oxford that he had $4,000 that he
did not know what to do with because
he could not get more than 2 per cent
interest foI it lying idle in the bank.
D, w. Cooley came to Wellington in
1871 when the town was laid out and
took quarter sectcn where the
Santa Fe depot is. He sold it for
$500 and went east, but returned
later and bought land in Oxford.
He owns half interest in the bank
In OvfOrd ond a nho1o eaot;Op oflona