The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1903-10-27

and this crew had to bring train CT
those back.
A good many people from the east are
coming into Thomas county and buying
lands. J. N. Fike. the boss Democrat
of the Sixth district, is running excur-
sions in here on the Rock Island from
northeastern Kansas. Farmers in Iowa
and other eastern states are coming into
the counties of northeastern Kansas
from Republic east. They are selling
their Iowa farms at 500 an acre or
more and are buying out the Kansas
farms at from $50 to $50 an acre. The
Kansas farmers who developed north
eastern Kansas 30 years ago, are coming
out here and buying new land at from
four to ten dollars an acre.
Some of the eastern farmers are COM
ing directly out here themselves, but fol
most of them this is too big a jump
Two or three days ago Mr.. Fike sold
the $50 acre farm of George Troutfelter,
four Iniles north of Colby, to an Iowa
man for $500 cash. AS soon as the
sale was completed the Iowa man said
he would not take IS 900 for his place.
Mr.. Troutfelter sold out to engage in
business in Colby with E. Boerner.
They will put up a big store building
opposite the postoffice and put in gem
eral merchandise stock.
F'ike is another politician who is too
busy selling real estate to pay any at
tention to politics He says $50 families
now and spring and buy new farms.
This will be an increase of Is per cent
in five months.
"The wheat crop of Thomas county
will bring the farmers about $500, 000,"
said Nh Fike. "They have about $780,,
600 worth of barley. and I suppose they
will sell upwards of half a million dol
lars worth of cattle. That is what is
building up this country. Land values
have doubled here in the last year or
TT,,I,r i- n
from four to eight dollars an acre, and
broken land from five to ten dollars.
The difference is largely in the location.
If it is close to railroad station or
surrounded by other we'll improved
farms it is worth more than if it is out
some distance in a range country"
People in these extreme western coun-
ties say the wheat acreage the coming
year will be as great as it was last year,
and greater in Sherman and Wallace
counties. 1t is too dry to pillow. but the
seed is being drilled in without blowing.
Then considerable spring wheat is
grown in this section, and what cannot
be sown this fall will be sown in the
spring.
This years crop turned out so much
better than was expected that the
farmers will put in all the wheat they
can. Like other sections, there is
great scarcity of help here, and for this
reason the acreage will not be as large
as it would be otherwise. Heretofore
Thomas county farmers have been con-
tent with ten or twelve bushels of
wheat to the acre. This year they got
twice that. The threshing returns are
even greater than was expected when
the wheat was cut. One man said his
crop turned out $500 bushels where he
had figured on only 1000. George Trout
! felter.. who has just sold his place. had
200 acres, but so of it was almost wholly
destroyed by hail. The remainder
! nd Is orr.n
than he counted on at harvest time.
Some of it yielded 35 bushels per acre.
There is a large amount of railroad
land on the market in western kansas
W. E. Ward, special land sales agent
for the Union Pacific, says that there is
a million acres of Union Pacinc land in
Kansas. Not only is this on the mar
ket, but considerable is being sold in
eastern Colorado. This land is sold on
such easy terms that the railroad COM
| pany is disposing of a great deal all
along the line. 1t sells for from two
dollars an acre up, payable one-tenth
with little money this sort of a propo-
sition is attractive.
Land spectators are getting hold of
vast tracts of railroad land, however.
The land lies in alternate sections.
When the Union Pacific was built in
| the sixties the government gave it as
| a subsidy every alternate section OF
| land for thirty miles on each side of the
]
for sale. Spectators are buying it in
large quantities at two or three dollars
an acre. expecting to hold it for the
raise. A year or two ago Franklin E.
Brooks, a capitalist of Cedar Rapids,
Iowa, bought $4,000 acres in Thomas
| and Logan counties. and more recently
he has purchased 10000 acres in Wal
lace county. This year Thomas and
Logan counties fell within the wheat
belt. and the land has already doubled
in value and is aDidly advancing. over
in Wallace county the land is just as
! GOOD and the county is better watered.
but the land can still be bought at from
50 to S5 an acre. because the county is
not so well settled and because it had
only a small wheat acreage and conse-
quently is rot known as wheat
| county.
Another Iowa CAPITALIST has pur-
! chased AS O00 acres, or all the railroad
land in the eastern tier of townships
over the state line in Colorado. 1t re-
quires comparatively little capital to
handle these big deals Only 10 per