The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-05-28
SOUTHERN PROGRESS
JACKsONvILI.E, FLA, THREE
 YEARS AFTER GREAT FIRE.
Except for the Missing Shade Trees, the City is More Beautiful and Substantial Than Eyer-Tbe
 States Development.

Baltimore, May 27.--(Special: )-Cor .i respondence from three Southern States in this weeks issue of The Man Gff.cturers Record throws mgnt upon pn, not always borne in mind In discuA- sIons of the South's material progress. Fsom jacksonville is sketched the te, Io since the fire which in May, 19el, purn- cd 2,600 houses and rendered nomS less l4,00o persons. It says: ~cert
 Three years have passed ana eASISSpii eAsISpi for the destruction of the peauaff ~ shade trees which lined the streets .. the city it is far before the fire. The old houses have been repiac- ed by new and modern structurss. Where 2,600 houses then stood ane aono are now considerably more than o,vvv, costing nearly $25,00O.O00. BuslneSs VI every kind has expanded and men nave nay, taken broader views .S or bais Sdc statc, Ortinism rules everywhere. Stir. ac- tivity and life are in the air. In tns hotels, in the. club, everyWnere TSn a6a State. of the great development in al, versified agriculture, of the phenomenal profits which are being maoe ssans the m e stos ries told about the fortunes made m fruit growing in California. ,..,, When. the great freeze pracotscathhs os ths State it was supposed that Florida had received a blow from which 1t mign. neyer fully bS on almost fns eyery one in the State except the immediate losers by the freeze, as great bless ing. It turned the attention or tne people from oranges, on which all in- terest was being centered. ana on which the prosperity of the State was then staked. to diversified farming. to pineapples.. tomatoes, potatoes, straw berries, celery and many other things which are yielding profits that sony times read like fairy tales, but which hx h1 n
 Moreover, with a better understand ing of the orange business and witt Knowledge, of the fact that once in destructive freeze, the growers have adopted better methods, and are bet ter able to protect their trees should after the freeze the orange industry languished, but gradually men of en- ergy took hold of it again and orange ? growing promises to prove as great in extent and far more profitable than ii was before, the estimate of some be- ing that this years crop will reach probable that below the frost line there will be developed an orange industry rivaling that of California where B. coo 000 boxes are now raised.
 But the entire orange business in Florida might be destroyed and still the State would become one of the most prosperous in the Union. With its diversity of soil it's great lumber and turpentine interests, its phosphate business, us charm Of climate Tor win ter tourists it has outside of the orange business sources of wealth sufficient to bring an abundant harvest of prosper ity. It is just beginning it's real devel- oI.ment just beginning to command the attention of the outside world and US owE people are just beginning to re- alike the greatness of their opportuni- ties. ."
 The same opportunities in diversified agriculture and industry are noted in correspondence from Jackson for Mis- sissippi, where have been seen in the rast few days fields of cotton, corn and oats and six weeks old alfalfa cut ting over eighteen inches high, and where beautiful furniture is being made from the long neglected tupelo- of development in Northwest Louisiana full of promise. This pictures the corn and cotton fields and the hardwood for eSts. the deposits of Ignite forming an inexhaustible supply of material for the manufacture of fuel briquettes which is to begin at Shreveport, and says
 Underlying the clay deposits around Mansfield just out of Shreveport are vast deposits of coal which will reduce the cost Of fuel for manufacturing pur- poses to the minimum. The best va rietIes of gum to be found anywhere in the South are along the Red River Valley in North Louisiana, and expert estimaters have said that some of this gum would cut as much as 30,0O0 feet per acre."