The Grenada sentinel. [volume] (Grenada, Miss.) 1868-1955, 1907-08-24

Delta which adJoined . piecs that wa
not drained. THE friend who men
toned above Put in his first string o3
tile several years ago. Ills land wac
of the same kind as that of his neigh
Dor across the fence, and they each had
| about the same sized tracts which were
wet. The first year was a very fine one
for cotton, and there was only a slight
difference in the amount each tract
yielded. The ~neighbor, of course, leased
my friend about sinking his good money
in tile. The next year was wet and
after a strong fight the neighbor across
the fence was compelled to abandon his
land to the weeds. My friends land
produced about three-eighths of a bale
to the acre. The next year my friend
completed his system by adding two
more strings of four-inch tile, and since
that time he has raised fine crops ev.
cry year. The comparison is really
amusing. for the neighbor across the
fence will not put in tile. The case now
stands something like this: Tract No. /
(my friends land) has about 81 acres.
During seven years it has produced IT'S
bales of cotton, although it has been in
corn and peas three years out of the
seven. On Tract No. 2 during the same
period his neighbor across the fence has
gotten 11S bales of cotton and no corn
and peas. If he keeps on farming that
land without tile, how much will he lose
on it in the next ten years?
snow, there is much food for re1cc-
ton in this incident. Suppose your
county has $4,000 acres of wet land
which is farmed every year at a loss,
and suppose that land should be tile
drained and made to yield this profit Of
SIS per year per acre? The difference
in your prosperity would be the differ
ence between $4,000 gained and the
Lord only knows how much lost. The
moral of all this is that so soon as
prosperity comes again in the Delta, as
it did in 1904, when your people went
wild over buying land and laid the foun-
dation for years and years of debt and
blasted hopes, laid the shadow of the
mortgage over half your plantations,
crippled your public works, took boys
and girls out of schools, checked the
growth of your towns and ended the
improvement of your lands-iust so
soon as prosperity m again let your
planters begin to tile their lands. Then,
Mr.. Editor, you will show to the world
what the Delta really is; a kingdom
in itself; n country where there is less
waste land than any other country I
know of and the most valuable tract OF
cotton land on the Western Hemisphere.
When Coahoma county is tiled it will
be demonstrated that it will not take
three, but q dozen oil mills to handle
the cotton seed produced; that Clarks-
dale will ship not 10000 bales of cot
ton, but -four times 10000. Clarksdale
will be the financial center of the Del
ia; railroads will be built, even if they
have to be built with home capital, and
a flood of energetic, ambitious people
will flock to Clarksdale and your coun-
ty. There is money to be made there,
and unlimited opportunities for he who
will work.
Georgia is already pointing the way,
and all things considered, the Delta has
in the production of crops. Your future
is wholly agricultural. You have no
chance to become a great manufacturing
country and you do not need it. When
your country begins to grow from five
to eight millions of dollars worth of
agricultural products there will be "a
powerful lot of money floating loose
around Clarksdale, and somebody is 60
ing to make a fortune. As matters now
stand you are hanging on to the ragged
edge of ruin,' and will continue to hang
there indefinitely, until you realize that
to farm in a country of heavy rains and
long drouths you must adopt some sys-
tenn which will save you from the rains,
tide you over the drouths, and that tile,
more than anything else that man has
been able to discover, will bring about
this result"
There is undoubtedly a great deal in
what this Illinois man says with refer
ence to drainage in the Delta. The good
people of that section are fast awaken
ing to a realization of the necessity Of
doing something to drain their land, as
has been evidenced by the formation Of
a number of drainage districts. Also. a
number of the farms are already tile
drained or in the course of completing
a system. The late Senator George
wisely provided for this in his will, and
the scheme is being carried out from
year to year. The Delta will be drained
and, as the gentleman says, it will be
by far the richest section of the West.
ern Hemisphere.