Dakota farmers' leader. (Canton, S.D.) 1890-19??, 1907-10-25
OF GOVERNOR CRAWFORD
Address Delivered at the Waterways Convention at
Memphis, Tenn, October 5th.
Our Governor Shows Why South Dakota Interests Lie in
Cheap Water Transportation.

A few years ago a dealer in wool
living at Pierre, South Dakota, wish
ed to ship 100000 pounds Of wool from
there to New York City. Upon in
quiry he learned that the freight rate
was over $500 per hundred from
Pierre to New York, while from Sioux
City. Iowa, about 200 miles down the
Missouri River below Pierre, the rate
to New York was 80 cents per hun
dred. Steam boat traffic upon the
river between Sioux City and Pierre
was very light and irregular, only one
or two boats making the trip in an
entire season. This wool dealer, how
ever, rather than pay the exorbitant
railroad rate, succeeded in hiring a
boat to take his wool from Pierre to
Sioux City for 40 cents per hundred,
including placing it on board cars for
New York.
BY this means he shipped it from
Pierre to New York for $l.2O per hun
dred instead of $500. The next year
the railroad company was forced by
the threat of river competition to re-
duce it's rate from Pierre to New
York to S1.15 per hundred, which has
since beer the rate. This is an in
stance of how waterway capable Of
floating commerce may be constant
check upon railway company, even
thought it actually carry little or no
traffic. 1 represent one OF the new
states thru which the upper Missouri
pours it's swift and muddy current on
the way to join the Mississippi. For
many years this great river interposed
a barrier to the railroads which enter
ed the state from the east side and
stopped building when they came to
it's eastern bank. At Pierre, the cap
ital, situated upon its eastern bank
near the geographical center of the
state, and at Chamberlain, about
ninety miles below, the.Chicago and
Northwestern and the Chicago, Mil
waukee and st. Paul Railway Com
panies for twenty years halted in the
extension Of their lines to the west.
About one half of the state lies on
the west side of this river and that
portion was without a railroad except
in the extreme west, where two lines
built north into the Black Hills from
Nebraska. Within that portion of
the state was country, embracing
about $4,000 square miles used for In
dian Reservations and grazing lands,
without a railroad.
The chief output from that great
section of the country. cattle, horses,
sheep and wool, was brought across
the river by ferry and shipped by rail
from Pierre and Chamberlain. Dur
ing the past five years, the conditions
there have undergone great change.
The lands have been surveyed, the In
dian lands allotted, the balance taken
by the homesteader and the rich pas
ture lands are being converted into
farms.
Three lines of railroad have crossed
the river and extended to the western
border of the state. The distance
from Pierre to Rapid City, in the
Black Hills, by rail, has been reduced
from 1000 miles to 1853 miles.
The prairies are filed with settlers;
towns have sprung up like magic; ma
tural gas has been discovered; com.
mercial revolution has come and the
traffic in and out of the country has
enormously increased. With this
new order of things upon us. our peo'
Pile are awakened to the important
part the Missouri River may play in
the future Of our state.
In the old times before the railroad
came, the upper Missouri was the
route by which the Indian trader
and government soldier reached the
far off Northwest. Steamboats, not
only came and went from St. Louis
to independence, but often passed on
1900 miles to FIT. Benton, Montana
carrying soldiers, military supplies,
scouts, trappers ahd Indians mission
aries; bring back furs from the Indian
country and gold from the placer
i
mines.
Lewis and Clark, Manual Lisa
Pierre Choteau Jr., George Catlin
Colonel Atkinson, Generals Harvey
Sully, Crook, Custer and the City O
St Louis are names forever linked
with the history of that great uppe
country, inseparably connected witt
with the old days of the plainsman
the scout, the trapper, and the buffa
10, now gone forever.
| Upon the discovery Of gold in th'
Black Hills in the seventies, ther'
Was-a heavy river trade from Siou,
City to Ft. Pierre, from which poin
passengers and freight were haulet
loyerland to Deadwood, 200 miles te
the west. Today, with three lines o
railway crossing this river and trav
ersing the state from east to west OF
their way to the Pacific and with th'
Northern Pacific and Great Northerl
doing the same thing in North Da
kota and Montana, the upper Mis-
souri, carries no commerce. Never