Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1905-09-23
TOPEKA LETTER.

The sugar beet industry has come
to stay in Kansas. f. D. Coburn. Sec
rotary of the state board of aQricul-
ture, saws the acreage is greater this
year than ever before and the yield
promises to be greater. The sugar
beet is the youngest industry of Kan
sas agriculture. Until 1901, the sugar
beet in Kansas was an experiment.
The experiment, however, was so
gratifying that the legislature of that
year granted bounty of a dollar
ton for all sugar beets grown in Kan
sas and manufactured into sugar.
This was the first legislative encour-
agement, by either the state or the
United States, that the industry had
been given. and the farmers began to
plant sugar beets for profit in Hamil-
ton and Finney counties.
Before that, Colorado growers had
been so successful that sugar factory
was established at Rocky Ford, not
far from the Kansas border. But
lower down the Arkansas Valley,
where climatic conditions were some
what different. the farmers we've not
willing to plant extensively until the
state offered bounty.
Encouraged by the fostering act of
the legislature, II growers who plant
ed 1877 acres in the two counties NAM
ed sent 1850 tons to the Rocky Ford
factory. Forty-three others grew
-beets, but there average was so small
and tonnage so light that they fed
hasr 20
OF sending it to the factory. In 1902,
IS growers planted 439 acres and sent
4, 250 tons to the factory. In 1908,
frost took the sugar beet plant of the
Arkansas Valley from one end to the
other, and 81 growers who planted
more than 800 acres in Kansas turned
in only 695 tons. That year, however,
was not without new lesson. for the
sugar beet was grown as far east as
Reno county, where three tons Of first
class beets we're produced on an ex-
perimental patch.
The best sugar beet year of all In
Kansas was 1904. It not only gave
the largest yield, but it added the
lesson that the sugar beet is for all
the western part OF the state. In
that year, Mr.. Coburn paid bounties,
not alone in. Finney and Hamilton
counties in the upper Arkansas Val
ley, but in Cowiey county, where the
club of Arkansas City
made a successful experiment, and in
Rawlins and Decatur coun-
ties on the Colorado and Nebraska |
borders, in the Northwestern part of |
the state, where more than 1000 tons |
were grown. In Cheyenne county the |
growers irrigated the plant. In Raw
Inns and Decatur counties there was |
no irrigation. In the upper Arkan-
sas Valley there was irrigation.
So, from the results Of-four years,
of the year 1904, it may be
predicted that the, valleys. OF. all of
Kansas the big Arkansas in
the southwest; the Smoky and its
forks in the central; and the Sappa,
the Prairie Dog, and the forks of the
Solomon in the northwest-will in
time be productive of the sugar beet,
and Kansas will become sugar state.
Indeed, it is already = sugar state,
but the producers need the fostering
help of the national government in
the form Of protective tariff.
The state bounty IS step, but
what is needed to hasten develop
ment of the sugar beet area is pro-
bected by act of congress. II ''infant
Industries" need protection, surely
The sugar beet is q fair subject OF that
lass of legislature. Later on, per-
laps, when the beet growers OF the
country become organ
zed, the assembled wisdom at WASH
ngton will take notice. Why tariff I
~ western votes on lumber and steel
md none on raw material of which
ugar is made?
The railroads are preparing to trans
,ort the big wheat and corn crops OIL
Kansas to market. They will need
more rolling stock to move the crops