Golden Valley chronicle. (Beach, Billings County, N.D.) 1905-1916, 1907-05-30

OF the Golden Valley in Billings county,
about three miles east of the line between
this state and the state of Montana. 1t is
one of the newer towns of that great new
country just being so rapidly developed on
the western border of the greatest wheat
fields that the world has ever known. Not
only great in acreage and quantity of yield
but of quality that has hitherto been un-
equaled among the wheat fields of the
earth. Golden Valley is vast plain lying
between the high range of buttes border
ing on the west side of the bad lands"
along the Little Missouri river and the
range of high lands east of the breaks of
the Yellowstone known locally as the
Blue Mountains" and consists of an area
about eighty miles north and south and
twenty-five to thirty miles east and west,
and while it may not in the strictsst sense
of the word, be valley proper. it has all
the appearances of valley and the quality
of soil and higher land on either side
makes the appellation descriptively correct
Climatic conditions of western North Da-
kota are but little understood out side of
immediate territory and to describe
these conditions so that they will be under
stood by those interested hut they have
not witnessed such, is a difficult tlsa, as
the conditions are 80 different from the
general impressions previously formed,
that they are hard to understand and ap-
preciate. The winters are not as long and
severe as one would naturally believe and
the summers are ideal. There is sufficient
rain fall to insure good crops. Not only
does theory bear out this conclusion but
facts for the three years past in which
actual agricultural experiments have been
tried, prove, so far, that this section has
no superior in the entire northwest. The
crops from this section took the premium
in the contests at the state fair last year
and from the experience of the entire
time since farming was commenced in
this section the same results may be
looked for again and probably every year.
The geological conditions are such that
water is found easily in all parts of the
territory and while there are not many
springs breaking out on the level land yet
in the breaks and coulies there are many
springs while at any place on the prairies
where wells have bsen dug water has
always been found in abundance. The
water is pure and generally soft. The
layers of sand are we'll filed with water
and found at a slight depth and the coal
veins are usually water bearing channels
for a flow of pure. clear water. In the
wells of this territory some surprises are
found in the quantity and quality of the
water obtained at the shallow depths. In
the many wells put down in the town of
Beach none were more than fifty feet and
some as shallow as twelve feet but mostly
fifteen to thirty feet deep with water all
the way from three to seventeen feet with
not dry we'll in the town. The amount
of coal to he found around Beach is great
and if the indications shown from the wells
put down should prove to be facts the ter
ritory is rich beyond belief in fuel depos-
its Covering an area of about 1000
svuare miles is to be found some of the
richest soil in all North Dakota. And
taking the crops grown as standard to
measure by, one of the best for the farmer
Last year number of farmers sowed
wheat and oats on the sod freshly broken
and got yields that would be considered
large for any kind of land under favorable
conditions. This is somsthing that the
eastern farmer cannot believe but the
crops were grown not by one man alone
but by many in various parts of the dis
trict. These crops were on exhibition at
various state fairs under the supervision of
the state and we all know with what favor
able results.
One of the experiment stations in con-
| nection with the state and the railroads is
located Just little northeast of the town