The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1902-01-08
DYKES MUST BE CHANG
Next Year Only the Upland, Embrac-
ing 1900 Acres Will be Gull
tivated by the Pen.
$500 ACRES IN LOW LANDS DISCARDED
Prison to Contract All Labor Possible For Rail
road Work. Will Cost S15, 900 to Change
Dykes and Legislative Action Will
ho AMo,tod

The devastation to the State farms on
the Roanoke by the breaking of the dykes
is beyond repair and they will not be re-
built.
The damage is estimated to be between
$4,000 and SIS, 900 and owing to the i'm
pcverished condition of the prison finan-
ces as the result of the breaking of the
dykes twice in one year it has been de-
csded to give up the cultivation of the
famous Roanoke low lands, which cover
an area of $500 acres and produce the
finest crops in the State.
The board of directors of the State
Prison went to Halifax Monday to view
the damage, having been called there in
special session. The farm was flooded
with water and it was impossible to g,t
an intelligent idea of the situation, so
the board decided to return to Raleigh
for a meeting. Two members of the
board got left at Goldsboro and the meet
ing could not be held here yesterday.
However, the members of the board are
all of one mind and Superintendent Mann,
knowing their ideas, will carry them out.
This is the prison program:
/. To abandon the $500 acres of low
lands, which are dependent upon the
preservation of the dykes tor cultivation
OF crops.
2. To cultivate next year only the 1000
acres of uplands, which FIRE not exposed
to the raging river torrents.
3. To let as many convicts out as posi-
BILE for railroads contract work Next
week 80 convicts go to Mitchell county
to work on the Ohio River and Charleston
Railroad.
Superintendent Mann said last night
THE loss to the prison is so severe that
we cannot undertake to repair it. We
spent the summer and fall repairing the
breaks in the dykes last spring and just
as we were completing this work the
water again broke over the barrier and
flooded the farm. We did not learn much
on our trip as the lowlands were COW
cred with water. We used boats and went
or the dykes, making such observations
as we could. l should say that the same
amount of dykes We're washed away as
were swept off by last springs freshet.'
Mr.. f. G. Hackett. member of the prison
board who went to Halifax, says about
twenty bales of cotton, between GOO and
200 bushels of peanuts and some forage
were destroyed. The water OH the Roa
noke, he says, only lacked eight inches of
going as high as it did last spring
Director w. E. Grassland says the 1000
acres of uplands IS worth what the State
gave for the farm. IF the dykes had
been completed they would not have
given away said Mr. Grassland. There
is no permanency in the dykes as they
are located at present and they are cal
culated to be swept away at any time.
BY sacrificing $50 or 200 acres of the low
lands, where the river makes it's turn I
believe the dykes can be made permanent.
At this point there is bluff on the other
side of the river and the water piles up
with great force. If the dykes should
be changed here and brought in for a
distance of $50 acres. | believe all the
present trouble would be remedied 1t
would take something like 5000 10 do
this work and we have not the money"
The board will make no attempt to re-
place the dykes until next fall CIR winter.
There is disposition to wait until the
Legislature meets and see whether that
body will appropriate $1,000 for making
permanent the dykes.
''These. lowlands will have to go" said
Mr.. Nathan OBerry, they have cost the
prison a great deal of money We had
barely complete the dykes when the last
storm swept away $4,000 worth of work.
I feel that the attempted cultivation of
the IowlandS must be done away with"