Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1907-05-16
INDIANA PEOPLE IN WESTERN
CANADA.
"What Shall We Do: I've Get to
Build Granarfes.o

"What Shall We Do: I've Get to
Build Granarfes."
letter written to a Canadian gov
eminent agent from Upton, Ind, is
but one Of many similar that are in
the hands of the Canadian government
agents whose privilege it is to offer one
hundred and sixty acres of land free,
and low railway fares. But here is a
copy Of the letter:
''Tipton, Ind, Nov. 2S, 1906.
"At your earnest solicitation party
of US from Upton left May - for
Western Canada. Our interviews with
you and a careful study of your litera-
ture led US to'expect great things of
your country when we should arrive
there, and we were not disappointed.
We went prepared to make a careful
examination of the country and its re-
sources, and we did so. At early dawn
the second morning out Of Upton we
awoke in a new world. As far as the
eye could reach was an apparently linn
itless eXpanse of new sown wheat and
prairie grasses. The vivid green of
and the inky blackness of the soil con-
trasted in a way beautiful to see. An
hour or two later we steamed into
Winnipeg. Here we found number of
surprises. A hundred thousand souls
we'll housed, with every convenience
that goes to make a modern, up-to-date
city-banks, hotels, newspapers, stores,
electric lights, street railways, sewer
age, water works, asphalt pavements,
everything. With eyes and ears open,
we Travelled for two thousand miles
through Manitoba, Saskatchewan and
Alberta, going out over the Canadian
Pacific Railway, via Calgary to Edmon-
ton and returning to Winnipeg over
the Canadian Northern Railway. In
the meantime we made several side
trips and stopped off at a number of
points where we nude drives into the
were evidences of prosperity. The
growing wheat, oats, rye fax, barley,
not little patches, but great fields,
many of them a square mile in extent,
the three, five and sometimes seven
horse teams laying over an inky black
ribbon of yellow stubble, generally in
burrows straight as gun barrels and
at right angles from the roads stretch
ing into the distance contrasted
strangely with our little fields at home.
The towns, both large and SMALL were
| doubly conspicuous, made 50, first by
their newness and second by the tow
| ering elevators necessary to hold the
immense crops of wheat grown in the
immediate neighborhood.
THE newness, the thrift, the hustle,
| the sound of saw and hammer, the
tents housing owners of buildings in
| various stages of completion, the piles
of household effects and agricultural
| implements at the railway stations
waiting to be hauled out to the
| Claims the occasional steam pillow
turning it's twenty or thirty acres
day, the sod house, the implanted house
of wood, the up-to-date modern resi-
dence with large red barn by, all these
were seen everywhere we went, an ear
nest of prosperity and wealth to be.
We talked with men and visited their
places that four years ago was unbro-
ken prairie. Their houses, barns, i'm
| plements and live stock were the equal
of anything in Upton County and why
not, when they were raising five, ten
and twenty, yes in one instance forty
thousand bushels of wheat a year.
| The fact that such large yields of
wheat are raised so easily and so sure
ly impressed US very favorably. And
| when we saw men who four or five
years ago commenced there with two
or three thousand dollars, and are now
as well fixed and making money much
easier and many times faster than lots
of our acquaintance on Indiana farms
fifty years cleared and valued at four
times as much, we decided to invest.
SO we bought in partnership a little
over two thousand acres, some of it
improved and in wheat.
Before leaving Indiana, we agreed
that if the opportunities were as great
as they were represented to be, that
we would buy, and own in partnership
body of land, and leave one of our
number to look after and operate it.
This we accordingly did.
Just before time to thresh 1 re-
ceived a letter from him. What shall
we do said he, I've got to build gran
aries. There's so much wheat that the
| railways are just swamped. We can't
get cars and the elevators are all full.
never saw anything like it, In re-
ply we wrote Good for you. Go ahead
and build, your story sounds better
than the letters we used to get from
our friends in Kansas when they be-
walled the fact that the hard wheat
had been destroyed by the chinch bugs
and the corn by hot winds, and that
| they must sell the stock for means to
live On Yes, build by all means
And he did, and our wheat put in by
a renter made twenty-seven bushels
per acre.
Every truly yours,
| ESD A. G. BURKHART.
ESD ]. TRELOAR-TRESIDDER,