Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1903-05-10
Something of its Merits and How it
Came to Arkansas
Written for the Graphic by Maj. G. w. Davis.

Inc history OI JOuuSOu GRASS oCCAio
to be kind of mystery TO many peo-
pie, especially to the all-cottOn man,
who can see no good in anything that
grows in the south but the f1eecy
staple.
Johnson grass has worked it's way
into America in much the same way
that it migrated from the land of its
nativity, Guinea, Soudan and the lands
south of the great Sahara desert, up
through Nubia, Egypt and into Ash
attic Turkey, from whence it was in
troduced into this country.
Johnson grass, though having diff
ferent names in the different countries
in which it is grown, is not looked
upon as curse and despised and
abused by every one-ideaed man who
can see no good in anything but cot
ton, but is regarded as the salvation
of the arid and worn lands in which
it exists Were it not for what is
known to us as Johnson grass, but by
different names in the different coun-
tries where it exists, many of those
countries would today be almost un-
inhabitable. It is tropical grass
gradually being adapted to colder
climate. It's root is large jointed,
looks much like cane roots, and goes
very deep into the ground, hence the
secret of it's keeping the ground soft
and moist where crops are planted in
land set in Johnson gass, for when
ever a root is cut off by hoe or plow
it sends up sap or watery substance
that moistens the parched earth and
has much the same effect of liquid
manure. True, it requires more Ia
Dor to grow cultivated crop i'm
Johnson grass, as the crop will bear
no neglect. On the other hand, the
crop is enough better for this extra
labor than it would have been had
the Johnson grass not been in the
land, to pay for all the extra pains.
This is a fact tnat has been fully
demonstrated by some of our best and
most successful planters. 1t is only
the lone -gallus,' go-easy cotton plant
er that objects to Johnson grass on
his place. He prefers to raise cot
ton on his baked brick, hot or sandy
land and buy baled prairie hay that
contains about as much nutriment
as baled excelsior, and buy that, too,
on credit, than to "bother with John
son grass
There is no grass that grows, if cut
at the right time and properly cured,
that contains more nutriment, life
sustaining or fattening qualities than
Guinea or Johnson grass. Jefferson
county can today produce cattle win
tered entirely on Johnson grass hay
that are fat enough to make good
beef. This to many may seem pre-
posterous. but it is nevertheless fact
that can easily be proven.
into the United States and into the
state of Arkansas in the following
manner: In the early days Of the
last century Gov. Means. of South
Carolina, who had once been minister
from this country to Turkey, and who
had become a warm personal friend
of the then sultan, was applied to to
send an experienced man to that coun-
try to show the Turks how to grow
cotton according to American meth
DDS. The man was sent. On his re-
turn to this country he brought as a
present from the Sultan to Gov Means
a quantity of Johnson grass seed. Gov.
Means sent it to a friend of his of
the name of Johnson, who was plant
err near Selma, Ala. and from whom
it takes It's name of Johnson grass,
to experiment with. It's growth was
SO extraordinary that samples of the
grass and seed were sent to the pat
ent office at Washington, the patent
Office at that time performing in part
the duties now incumbent upon the
agricultural department. The late R.
w. Johnson. then United States SEN