Dakota farmers' leader. (Canton, S.D.) 1890-19??, 1907-05-17
INDIANA PEOPLE IN wEsTE1K
CANADA.
"Whnt Shall We Dor I've Got -
Build ~ranarles

- ~ nat Sn0II w e DO !" I've 9Ot -
Build Granarles."
A letter written to a Canadian gov
ernment agent from Upton, Ind, 10
but one Of many similar hat are in
the hands Of the Canadian government
agents whose privilege 1t is to offer n
hundred and sixty acres Of land free,
and low railway fares. But here Is a
copy Of the letter:
"Tipton, Ind, Nov. %, 1906.
"At your earnest solicitation a party
of us from Upton left May 10 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 n 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 in apparently linz
ltless expanse OF new sown wheat and
prairie grasses The vivid green of
the wheat just beginning to stool out.
and the inky biacknesS of the soil con-
trasted in a way beautiful to see. An
hour or two later we steamed into
Winnipeg. Here we found a 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 put 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 made drives into the
surrounding country. On every hand
were evidences OF prosperity. The
growing wheat, oats, rye, fax, barley,
not Attle patches, but great fields,
many Of them a square mile in extent,
the thtee, FIVE and sometimes seven
horse teams laying over an inky black
ribbon OF yellow stubble, generally in
burrows straight as CUR barrels and
at right angles from the roads stretch
ing into the distance, contrasted
strangely with our little fields Mt home.
The towns both large and small, were
doubly censpicusus, made so, first by
their newness and second by the tow
ertng elevators necessary to hold the
immense crops Of wheat grown in the
immediate nefghborhoed.
s1The 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 N agricultural
implements at the railway stations
waiting to be hauled out to b
Claims the occasional steam pillow
turning its twenty or thirty acres q
day, the ssd house, the Imprinted 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, Inn
plements and live stock were h equal
Of anything in Upton County and why
not, when they were raising Ave, 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
-oc ~, oco nnr,.ooronI %ItnroH x.yi%b f~ryN
or three thousand dollars, and are now
as well fixed and making money much
easier and many times faster than lots
Of our ncquaintances on Indiana farms
nifty 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
anpesved and In wheat.
Before leaving Indiana, we agreed
that II the opportunities were al great
a. they were represented to be, that
We would buy, aud W In partnership
a body Of land, and leave n of our
number to look after and operate It.
This we accordingly did.
"Just before time to thresh / 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.
1 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 tile 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.
VERY truly yours,
esd A. G. BURKHART,
"(Sd) j. TRELOAR-TRESIDDER,
"(Sd) WALTER w. MOUNT"