The Republican journal., 1904-07-14
The NEW MONTANA
To Lead in Irrigation, Agriculture and
Mining.

WASHINGTON, D. c., July 10. The
great copper, silver, and gold mines of
Montana, the Treasure State of the |
Union, potent as has been their influ-
ence in her development and while they
are yet far from their maximum output
and value, must soon take second
place in the States resources. 1t is
Montana's destiny to be one of the rich
est agricultural states in the Union.
As the agriculture of Colorado, now
the foremost State in the production of
precious metals, has already outstripped
her mines, so in few years will Mon
tana's farming lead her mines. With
lands of surprising fertility, in which
agricultural plant food has lain stored
for centuries, with no drenching rains
to leach them away, and with magnif-
icent water supply from the rain and
SHOWS which fall upon the high peaks
and water sheds of the Continental
Divide, Montana's fat cattle and sheep,
splendid fruit, heavy grains and varied
agricultural products will become wide
ly famous.
"The next ten years said a prominent
official of the Government Reclamation
Service, in speaking of the great present
and coming development of the far
northwest, will see Montana lead all
the western States in the area of her il
rigated land. Her agricultural future is
assured and brilliant. She has the land
and she has the waterfall that are
needed in the arid region to produce
fabulous wealth"
Montana has an area equal to that of
France. She has, it has often been
stated by various authorities, with all
her great water supply conserved and
made to irrigate her rich lands, room
for as dense a population as that of
France.
Over three-fifths of this great State is
drained by the Missouri River and its
big tributaries, such as the Yellowstone,
the Jefferson, the Milk River and other
branches. Strong rivers these are, rush
ing down out of their mountain fast
ness es-the Absaroka, the Snowy, the
Big Horn and the Wind River ranges
Where at elevations of and 10 and
II thousand feet the SHOWS are perpet
ual, melting under the summer suns and
furnishing constant water supply. es-
pecially in the late summer when it is
most needed for irrigation.
Much has already been accomplished
by cooperative effort in irrigation
among farmers. The irrigated area,
according to the census figures, has in
creased during the past two years at the
rate of about 100000 acres a year and
now aggregates 114OOO0 acres. This
has been accomplished by the co-opera-
ton of small communities and some of
the most successful examples are seen
at such places as Hinsdale and Chinook
i'll the Great Milk River Valley where
farmers have combined, taking up land
under the tje-year homestead law and
constructing their own irrigation works.
thus owning the land and the water and
paying no rent or tribute to water COM
panles or water bond-hOlders.
Most of these works have been sim
pie diversion propositions without ex-
pensive dams and the cost has been very
light, land reclamation averaging ac-
cording to the 1900 census, but 1892 per
acre. The opportunities are legion
where bands of twenty or forty or one
hundred enterprising farmers with lit
tie money and with their strong arms
and good teams may build diversions or
storage dams and lead the water out
upon 160-acre homestead claims, build
ing up homes upon the desert which
will make each and every one of them
prosperous and wealthy. The great
productivity of Montana's lands is
shown by the census figure. The total
amount invested in bitches in Montana
up to June l, 1900, was 81, $50, O73. 90.
while the total value of irrigation pro-
ducts for the one year, $780, was 1920
042.O
At the rate of increase in farming and
irrigation in the State during the last
census decade the next ten years will
see Montana's cultivated area trebled if
not quadrupled, even leaving out of
consideration the vast reclamation
works proposed by the Federal Govern
ment under the irrigation law.
The project for storing the flood wat
ers of the Milk River in Northern Mon !
tana under the direction of Engineer
Cyrus G. Babb, of the Geological Survey
is one of the first great works investi- |
gated by the Government engineers,
even before the passage of the national |
act. This involves huge dams
and canals, and will reclaim, when car
ried to full completion very large area
half million acres-of ex-
ceedingly rich land in the already IA
nous Milk River Valley. 1t will be a |
famous engineering exploit, by which |
the water now flowing into the Saskat-
chewan, and thence into Hudson Bay
will be carried into the Missouri basin
IA