The Fargo forum and daily republican., 1906-01-16
When God made the white man,
He seemed to think it best,
To begin the job down east,
And finish it in the west.

4 ~
To begin the job down east,
And finish ,it in the west.
ut was a recent belief and the be-
lief may still be current in some parts
of our broad land, that a little fringe
of country along the Mississippi river
was the only habitable region west Of
B that great artery until the foothills of
the Rocky mountains were reached.
& Where there were no trees the land
must be sterile and valaeless This was
! the idea prevalent among the early set
tiers Of Illinois. and across the Missis-
sippi in Iowa and in southern Minnesota,
in which states the timber along the
streams was cleared off BY hard labor
and homes built up in the ciearings as
was the case in the east. while the
prairie away from the forest strips
were left to those who came later and
had no choice but to takethe open land,
"Ihe prairies, broad and beautiful.
For which the speech Of England has no
name.
Abundant field and garden crops
proved the fertility of the prairies, but
another error had to be dislodged. and
that was that fruit, shade and forest
trees would not grow in the open counI
try. This fallacy went down before the
march Of experience and today the
prairie regions west of the Mississippi
and Missouri are dotted all over with
forest groves and orchards 5
Itswas De Tocqueviile who said thai
8 s'ths gradual and continuous progress of
the European races toward the Rocky
mountains has the soleinnity of Prov
idential event; it is like a deltge of men
rising unabatedly and daily driven on
/ ward by the hand Of God. z That was
written by the great Frenchman more
than seventy years ago when Chicago
/ was a frontier town, and this northwest
was not as we'll understood as central
Africa is today If onr Partisan states
man considered the OK team movement
of population "a deluge OF men, what
would he think of the mighty. waves
which have rolled westward in later
years. after Horace Greeley had Mt
tered his sententious advice, Ego west,
Young man and grow up with the coun-
try. What would he have thought of
Max Bass, who in recent years has
had the habit of gathering 1000 or
more people at a time, with their goods,
and transporting them from old homes.
in eastern states and within the week
have them scattered about in new homes
on the fertile prairies Of North Dakota.
Vast regions have been settled before.
by the slow process of the years, but
I never as now under the iivincible whip
of steam and lightning. Quick and easy
transportation can now make a country
rich and populous which once was diff
Z cult Of access and really undesirable
without connection with the rest of the
world. The steel rail now penetrates
the western plains and mountain val
Il leys, and towns and cities have been;
dropped along the way like beads on a
string. "A man need not be old to re-
member when Illinois seemed out among
d the Indians and a trip to Iowa or Miii-.
nesota was like a journey to a far coiin-
try. Now a dozen railroads reach the.
\ Rocky mountains and more than half
dozen have crossed the great barrier
and water their iron horses in the Pa
I cific And half of the really great
4 transcontinental routes ruin across
North Dakota and the fourth one
touches our boundary at several points,
and no other northwestern state IS bet
ter served in this respect.
What is universally known as the
northwest is really the center Of
North America. the oldest of conti-
nents. The northwest is at the head
Of the largest and most fertile valley in