Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1902-10-30
e be State Day by Day.
News Of In
e terest. 4
GREAT CHANGE IN THE WEST.

s~ese~~~~~~ses~s~>ses
GREAT CHANGE IN THE WEST.
Great Change Noticeable in the Con.
ditions of Western North Dakota
Since Early Days.
Thirty years ago soldiers who
marched from Sioux City to North Da-
kota with Gen. Sully though that this
region would never be inhabited by
white men; certainly not within Pc
riod of thirty years, says the James
town Alert. At that time there were
only the buffalo, wild fowl, wild ami
mails and wild Indians, with an occa-
slonal trarper and hunter of the white
race living along the streams, silent.
unprogressive, and generally opposed
to the settlement of the whites. One
of the early-day soldiers, j. D. Harker
of Tappen, who came to what is now
this state in 1864, was then young
man fond of adventure He wanted
to see the country and get taste Of
life in the Far West. He Joined the
United States army and was partic-
irant in several of the fights with the
Indians, getting an opportunity to see
the actual life of the prairie aborigi-
mes, and the actual condition of the
country as it existed at that time, and
which, had, no doubt, existed in the
same condition for many centuries be-
fore. The soldiers thought that it
would be impossible to ever kill Oft
the buffalo, SO numerous were they on
the prairies. Immense herds could be
seen, never out of sight for days at a
time. The Indian always had his at
hand; and at times the buffalo were
so thick that it was necessary for the
soldiers to form a line behind the
camp wagons, to divide the travelling
herds of buffalo and keep from being
run over and trampled to death.
The prairie grass was then much
thinner than now, and the great
cracks in the ground, due to drought
and heat, were so wide that on several
occasions dead soldiers were buried
in them, being made wide enough by
a little excavation. This was done
in Dickey county, and elsewhere, and
the report of Gen. Hazen, made later,
that this country was nothing but
desert, was no doubt true, as he saw
it. The water of the lakes and ponds
were then nearly all alkali, much
ollOlSSl lldu 1lONy anu lucle WS1S
more ponds in the spring. The SOL
diers got accustomed to drinking cof-
fee made from the alkali water, that,
when boiled, looked more like cream
than coffee.
The Indians had, for centuries,
burned off the grass, which scared
the top of the SOIL making the surface
hard and tough and shedding the rain
fall into the lakes and coulies instead
of allowing it to sink into the ground
and preserve the moisture for anoth-
er season, as at present. The SHOWS
of winter also drfted readily from the
blackened and bare surface of the
country into ravines, and accumulat-
ed in spots on the face of the country.
instead of spreading out in sheet
and melting slowly in the spring, and
soaking into the ground, as is now
done over the grass-coyered and Gull
tivated surface. The soldiers little
dreamed that. in less than twenty-five
years the Indians would be gone, the
buffalo become extinct, the prairie
fires stopped, the grass allowed to
grow thick, the land cultivated and
the State of North Dakota become
erected from the desert into a region
of prosperous homes, growing towns
and cities, giving to it's people the
greatest per capita of wealth of any
state in the Union. But such has be-
come the fact.
Another change that has become ap-
parent is the modification of tile ex-
tremes of heat and cold that once pre-
vailed in this region; and which same
change has occurred over the country
comprising the states to the south of
this. The cultivation of the soil and
the preservation Of moisture in the
ground seems to have the effect of
changing the climate in this respect:
and there is no doubt that this state
will undergo the same transformation
IN the matter of modification of ex-
tremes Of climate, and the growth OF
crops that was once impossible to-
raise that have been in the
States of Minnesota, Iowa, Kan
sas, Nebraska and Illinois. And
there is no reason to doubt
that the same rise in the val
tivated states.
In the early days the great source
OF value to the country was the grass
1t fed the buffalo by the million, and
should feed domestic cattle in almost
equally as great numbers. Buffalo
grass has become celebrated the
world over for its nutritious proper
ties, and the value of this grass as a
fattening food is the same the year
round. 1t is natural stock food that
is yet the greatest source of wealth to
be found in the state. Supplemented
by the raising of cultivated feed
crops. the grass resources of North
Dakota will make the state the great
est stock region in the country in a
short time.