Arizona republican., 1908-02-10

value. to every acre of land, to every business enterprise. and to every home that il serves. We need, and should have. the constant and active support of every land owner. merchant. banker, professional man and mechanic in the community being exploited. A great interest can be aroused among the thousands of tenant farmers in the east and middle west. Many of these renters have sufficient capital to buy small tract of land in the irrigated sections of our great southwest.
 There is. throughout the middle west. another class of farmers, whose high priced lands are yielding them no more than five per cent and in many cases less. These men and their fam lilies are willing to sell their present holdings and buy the irrigated land of the reclaimed districts of the south west where they can raise more on one acre than they can on five acres Of the best farms in illinois and Iowa. These farmers have studied irrigation and are well versed in its advantages They appreciate the practical side of it and are alive to the investment side of the proposition. There is still another class of people. They com prise quite large majority; they are the wage earners in our large cities. who have accumulated some money and are desirous of getting small farm. The mixed farming. which re- quires 160 acres or more, does not ap peal to this class of people as the irri- gated sections do. as irrigated lands will support a denser population. which means better social conditions and many of the advantages of an urban community.
 "The reclamation service is doing a vast amount of good in exploiting the advantages of irrigation and as We have said before. can only be inter- ested in coloniZing so far as it may mean the reclamation of the lands under the various projects. The quick CT the lands are put under cultivation and made productive the sooner sue cess will be attained. which will jus tify similar expenditures in other sec tions that may be reclaimed by gov ernment aid
 The question of interesting more people in irrigation requires consider able ingenuity and the expenditure of large sums of money in advertising and personal solicitation on the part of travelling immigration agents. The Earth a monthly paper, published by our company. costs us SlO,0O0 q year. The columns of the journal are de- voted to the interests of the southwest. This. together with our folders and general newspaper advertising. runs the expenditure up into the many | thousands of dollars year. It is my ! opinion that but few people have a conception of what we are doing and how we are reaching out for more business to build up these great val | leys. each one Of which will some day
 be an empire in itself.
 The possibilities in these valleys are greater than the average man can conceive, and in my years of expe- rience I have never seen a time when there was a greater interest among the people. or stronger desire to own land than there now is And to use a hOmely phrase, now is the time to get busy" The interest is aroused and. while We are in the field for ev- erything in sight. the actual securing of the business must be left to the various communities We are willing. however. to spend our money in ex- plotting these enterprises; it is to our interest to do so. but we only propose to help those sections who are will ing tO be helped and naturally we prefer to help those who help them selves.
 The field is large and our resources | for getting in touch with people who are interested in the southwest. are far reaching, and We believe that all the communities are sufficiently ben efited. that they should be glad to come to us and say: How can We cooperate with you? You are spend ing your money to arouse this interest all over the country; you have not called on us to bear even small share of this burden, but there are some things we should do. Let us work together
 Tn most instances the opposite is the case; We are not saying this com plainingly as we expect to do more than ever and are now planning on the greatest campaign We have ever uIutTldhen, anu IT lnere was closer community of interests between these various sections and the colonization department. we would attain far great CT results.
 Our position is analogous to that occupied by the reclamation service; it is constructive; the development re- quires large organization. but the final success devOlves upon the local people.
 This is a topic that might be pro- longed indefinitely, but the vital ques- tion in which we are all interested. is how to get more people for these various localities in which the recla- nation service is interested. As the Salt River valley is the nearest one to this meeting. in which We are espe- ciaily interested, let us outline cam paign and see if it will not be possi- ble to draw considerable fire to that valley. We put on few features that are bringing good results and if the business is followed up, it will mean a number of new families for that val ley. If there are gentlemen present from the Salt River valley I would suggest that they make a canvas of every settler in the valley and find out where he came from and get a list of his friends in the east and get in touch with those people by corres- anA tr~itb