Dakota farmers' leader. (Canton, S.D.) 1890-19??, 1904-08-26
Knockers.

AAu6AOo SouAVJ % sNAAOAO SA"o SSSAA
open to settlement for the past "a
years, with forty.two miles of railway
and has the state capital-which the
Pierre people say help increase land
values, and still their Hughes county
lands are on the market to-day at prices
ranging from So to SO an acre (some of
it in the city limits Of Pierre at $40 an
acre) without any buyers. Charles
Mix county, which was opened to set
tlement twenty-four years ago, and
part of it not opened to settlers until
nine years ago, never had mile of
railroad until three years ago, and that
railroad only extends two.thirds of the
way across the county to-day. But the
Charles Mix county lands are on the
market to-day at prices ranging from
$50 to $40 an acre with many buyers
The population of Hughes county, taken
by the national government in 1900
gives them 1854 men, women and child
ren-2, 3O6 of whom are confined to the
city of Pierre alone. The Charles Mix
county population, taken the same year
gives them, S,49S, or nearly three times
as large a population, before Charles
Mix had mile of railroad.
We are writing for South Dakota
readers and ask them whether any
thing is gained, in the long run, by
telling the truth Land men in the
Jim valley have met encouragement
from the adverse reports carried east by
those who have visited the reservation
west Of the river. Here is a fact. If it
knocks we cannot help it. There has
been railroad into Pierre for twenty.
four years and it has been stated, and
not denied. that there is not grain
elevator in eigher Hughes or Hyde
counties. More grain is shipped each
year from any one of six different
stations in Sphinx county than from the
whole of Hughes and Hyde counties.
Does this knock2 Whose is the folly
1t is not on the part Of the Gas Belt
boomers2 1t is not from the Pierre
capital committee. who insist that the
center Of population will follow the
geographical center?k There is large
part of the states of Vermont and New
Hampshire which have, after two
hundred years of settlement, a sparse
population. It would be folly to say
that 1t was because the country was nc
good, for it has a value The hills and
mountains says the makers Of books
make excellent grazing grounds and
dairying is there carried to it's highest
perfection, and yet the population has
been, is now and ever will be very thin.
It is not to deceive the people but to
undeceive them that facts are being
published. The population of the four
counties nearest Pierre shrank 5000 in
the ten years from 1890 to 1900. Like
the problem of the frog in the we'll,
who jamped up two feet every day and
fell back three every night how long
would it take the frog to jump out. A
coterie of Pierre boomers and the
Northwestern railroad wanted the capi-
tai at Pierre and by the expenditure Of
several hundred thousand dollars they
got it. Who has ever taken any pride
in it, What is the impression on a
visitor to our state who visits iti
What gathering of state bodies ever
met there2 Why. was the Presbyter'
ian college, for which costly build
lug has been erected, moved to Huron
The financial history of Pierre has been
the worst knock" our state ever got
I-Redfeld Press.