The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-04-17

I. Z. Diesem, of Garden City,
Tells of Interest.
Farmers Preparing to Plant
More Ground.

According to I. L. Diesem, of Garden
City. who is in Topeka today. the farm
ers of the Arkansas valley who ac
tually farm win pay a great deal of at
tention to sugar beets this year. al
though the sugar beet acreage in the
immediate vicinity Of Garden City will
not be as large as it was last year
The reason for this. Mr.. Diesem ex-
plains, is that merchants and bankers
and other town people last year signed
contracts with the Rocky Ford sugar.
factory company, agreeing to plant a
certain amount of heets, sometimes as
high as rs acres. They did this simply
to raise the acreage high enough to get
the sugar factory to back the expert
ment but they paid little attention To
the cultivation of the beets. This year
that class viii drop out and the real
farmers have increased their acreage
They have also prepared their Irriga=
ton plants with special reference TO
properly watering the beets.
Il have never seen Finney county IN
a better condition than it is at present.
said Mr.. Diesem. 7 have lived there
seventeen years and never saw a better
spring than this has been. We had a
good supply of moisture early and dur
ing the past week we have had more
rain. / would not be surprised if We
could get along until June without lfrl-
eating.
What we most need in that region is
a class of immigrants who will come IN
and take small farms and raise beets,
Those who are established in other
lines do not like to turn their attention
entirely to beets."
Mr.. Diesem says that irrigation
from wells is not only successful in the
valley along the river, but can also be
successfully accomplished in many
places on the uplands This is impos-
sible further west in Colorado, as there
is no underfiow there. At Rocky Ford
we'll water cannot be obtained except
at a depth of about $50 feet, and all the
irrigating must be done through ditch
es leading out of the river
There has been more or less talk about
locating a sugar factory at Garden City.
but it will not be located there until the
beet acreage in the tributary territory IS
sufficient to justify it. It takes from
fully run factory with a capacity of
500 tons of lbeets a day. This is the size
Of the one at Sugar City, Colo, Ii miles
north of Rocky Ford, and last year 1t
utilized the product of about $500 acres.
This year that acreage will be consider
ably increased
Three years ago the ground where
Sugar City stands and that on which
the beets are raised was covered with
buffalo grass and there was not a farm
house in the locality It was simply
grazing land. The sugar company built
its factory and bought three thousand
acres of land which 1t prepared for beet
raising. hiring the labor done. The first
year everybody lived in tents, but since
then a town has sprung up around the
factory and a few farm houses have
been built. But even now many of those
who raise beets on the eonpany's land
live in tents. Outside of the company
land farmers have bought small tracts
and have commenced to raise beets.
A man from Ellsworth county took his
family out to Sugar City a year ago
and contracted with the company to
raise beets. The company. plowed the
ground and planted the beets and the
man and his family cultivated, thinned
and harvested them. the company fur
nishing the water for irrigating The
family lived in tent all summer, and
at the end of the season, five months,
the man drew check for $40 for the
summers work CT himself and family
He Went back to Ellsworth county to
spend the winter agreeing to return and
raise beets again this spring.