River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1902-10-09

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The following speech was delivered
by Jas. j. Hill at Elbow Lake, MIMI
Mr.. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen
/ want to assure you this afternoon that
it is a matter of unusual pleasure to meet
you here. 1 am glad to see the farmers
here with their wives. 1t IS a privilege
that 1 enjoy to meet the people who have
come into this part of the country ana
made it what we see it today.
ut is few months more than thirty
years since I first passed through this
part Of the state. At that time the
outpost was a little store on the NH
by the old--what we may call the old
church at Evansville After leaving EV-
ansville we stopped all night at Mrs.
Burne'G, and the next night we stopped
on the prairie all night and walked TO
keep warm. 1t was on the 10Th OF March,
and / assure you it was very cold NOW,
to me this is an unusual pleasure, ana
there Is no place where l couId meet
with more pleasure than in your county.
The change that has occurred is graft
flying and it must be gratifying TO you
in that you have been able
To Work the Change,
and 1t is always gratifying to me to know
that 1 have been able in some way 10
aid in bringing about this change. The
country looks beautiful today, ana
see within and without the town not
fruit Of it as well. L see good stock. l
see nice cattle. and just as good sheep
as you will find IN any part OF the coun-
try Years ago, back in 1883, we had
a very dry season after the grain was
planted. Until July not drop OF rain
fell in the northern part of the state,
particularly in the Red river valley but
notwithstanding the long drouth, after
the rain fell they got a three-quarter
crop. / felt then that the farmers should
not have all their eggs in one basket.
/ thought they should have a greater
diversity of things their farms II
a man lost his wheat crop and he had
half a dozen good fat steers to sell he
could get some money and bridge over
for another year.
II decided to raise cattle on my farm
at Lake Minnetonka. I had to buy my
experience. L bought some fancy cat
tie at very extravagant prices My fences
were let down. With a little reward to
the men l could find the cattle. Some
times they would come after l had re-
warded them a few times and offer to
tell me where the cattle were, and said
they would find them for so much.
presume it was the ferociOus stare OF
the bull that tore down the fences, but
I made up my mind that 1 could not
in my lifetime succeed as I wanted, and
] sent men to the country and bought
up a large number of bulls for three or
four years. and today 1 saw as handsome
cattle in your own county as a man would
wish to see. 1t did me good as l saw
before me proof that my endeavor
Had Not Been in Vain.
Now, / can say to you that no one in
the state or out of it has such great
interest in the people of the state and
the people who are cultivating the land
as myself No man has a greater in
terest-put it all on selfish gain if you
fI,n Ic1s.o 1Nff nTI1tIA
then 1 have. because if your labor is
wasted what becomes of me? If you
are poor, L am poor. / am glad to see
the evidence of your prosperity, for we
must share your prosperity with you.
1t can't be otherwise
"All that we have been doing, all that
1 have tried to do in the way of building
up the success of the country, is on the
ground that the man who cultiVateS the
soil must make the money before he can
pay it, and in that we have the
foundation of our own prosperity, and
our company has been prosperous. All the
transcOntinental lines that have been
built across the continent either in Can
ada or the United States have been sub
Sidzed with the exception of our own.
All of those of this country have failed
from one to three times, except our own,
and the only credit we can take to our
selves for being able to avoid these fail
ures is that we have tried to bring the
Ordinary Principles of Business
to apply to railroad enterprise-never to
undertake to do more than we could af
ford to do and not to run ahead in a wild
speculative career, but going ahead
cautiously. if the soil is good and the eli
mate is good to be patient and encour-
age the people. When you have these
ideas fixed in your mind you have the key
that must solve the difficulty. We have
now come to the point where our road
has been extended to the Pacific ocean.
We have there the largest forests of pine
timber growing on this continent and the
finest l have seen in the world. The
lumber trees in Minnesota are practically
all counted.
~ few years ago the country east of
Detroit north of the Chesapeake and
south of the Great Lakes drew it's supply
of lumber from Michigan and later from
Wisconsin. During the earlier times in
Michigan lumber was worth so to 60 cents
a thousand, but today it is worth $12
q thousand in the tree. Fortunes were
made in Wisconsin pine lands. The
foundation for Cornell university was laid
from an investment in Wisconsin timber
lands We have on the Pacific coast
Enormous Forests.
z You want them here. They want
them as far south as Baltimore and as
far east as Portland, Me. Now bear
this in mind: What helps YOU what you
need and what we need is the assistance
of each other. and to help each other
bear our burdens. The people who own
and manufacture that lumber on the
coast are seeking a market for it. These
efforts affect you beyond the price of
lumber; they affect you by contributing
so many tons of freight to haul over our
lines. We have gathered all these tons
from the Pacific coast and from beyond
t:le Pacific.
There are four or five times as many
trains on the line as there were years
ago. but the capital of the road is prac-
tically the same The increased earn
ings and the increased amount of bust
ness has placed us in position where we
can reduce rates, but we have our divi-
dend every year We have got to a noint
where we can earn our dividends. That
is all we can get. If we earned three
dividends we would only divide one. We
get per cent on our stock and it is a
safe investment That is good enough
and we ought to be satisfied. Some peo-
pie try to persuade you that we want to
WORTH A PASSING THOUGHT.