Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1906-01-15

| magnificent and lands bring fabulous
prices if we'll watered and planted
saw one range of eighty acres with nice
buildings and $4,000 apple house. 1t
was all planted and all the live stock
and machinery went with it. 1t be-
| longed to two bachelor brothers. One
| had died, and the other one Offered
this ranch for sale at $4,000. An apple
house like this built on scientific prn-
ciples, means that you can have solid,
! smooth and lucious apples in June the
next year.
! The Ashenfeltcr ranch, it is claimed,
is worth over $500 an acre, and they
claim the owner has refused such an
offer. 1t may be true, but in spite of
all claims, | don't believe it pays. The
owner is engaged in other lucrative
pursuits, and this $40 acre orchard
is his fad. OF course it is most beau
| forna. not even Lucky Baldwin's
ranch, to compare with it. 1t was as
clean as a garden and as symetrical as
ship. There were apple orchards and
| peach orchards and cherry orchards,
prunes, apricots, plums, damsons.
cages, etc. Everything but the pear.
Recently pear pest appeared which
| destroyed all the pear trees and they
We're cut down. They will conquer the
pear slug and have pears again. But
| in the fruit business no sooner is one
pest overcome than another appears.
The buildings on the Ashenfelter
ranch and the spacious grounds are
very attractive. Here an army of men
is employed. The entire orchard is
sprayed five times each year or season.
He has a foreman at $1,000 year; a
bug man from California, at $1,S00
Il Year Last year was a bad year, the
year before good one. Nothing but
The culls from such an orchard find
their way to the local market. The
fruit houses of New Yorl. and Philadel-
phia send out their agents each year.
They buy the entire product dhe
choiee) in the field at so much per
box. The 80 pound box there is the
standard. They do their own packing,
the rancher furnishing the buildings
and pickers only All second class
fruit is thrown out and this the owner
sells at home.
When such lands such opportunities,
are offered men, can not understand
The other day l read a letter in one
of the local papers, the Grinnell Her.
aid, from young man, son of we'll
known Poweshiek county farmer. The
letter was we'll done and very interest
ing, because it was natural, real and
true 1t was not written for publica-
ton, but was written to his father.
think it came from Highmore, N. D..
The young man spoke Of the intense
cold, the deep snow; how, If he had
team, he could make good wages
hauling fuel, it was so scarce and
high how he had packed a little wood
on his back three miles, and how he
had hauled water a long distance.
thought to myself such a country calls
out all mans surplus energies. An
expenditure of the same energy three
months out of the twelve in the Mont
rose valley in Colorado will yield
man greater returns than twelve
months hard work and horrible priva-
ton and suffering will yield in the
country where this young man has cast
his fortunes. l simply cannot under
stand what leads men to endure what
they must endure in such country,
when those beautiful and fertile VAL
leys await them in the west.
The north pole beckons Walter Well
man and he is going to risk his life i'm
an airship. No. there is no risk about
tit is certain death. Nevertheless.
he says he is going, so the young man
can go to those cold, bleak, cherries
countries if he will, as for myself,
vastly prefer the certain crop, the
good water, the cheap fuel the mild
winter and the never failing health of
the irrigated valley of the west.
The end.