The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1909-01-16
60 WEST, YOUNG MAN.

Those who know James ]. Hill best
say there is nobody who understands
so well as he does how to keep rail
road trains moving back aud forth
across half continent like the shuttles
in loom. But Mr.. Hill has been 60
ing for several years, and during that
time he has picked up some informa-
ton that has not to do with trains. He
understands farming as many man
who runs farm does not.
Why Mr.. Hill is not great farmer
instead of great railroad man must
remain mystery unless the explana-
ton be contained in the remark he
made while speaking on another SUBJ
ject. He was talking about the des-
tiny OF the great whether it
was destined to be mighty empire
teeming with population and laden
with riches.
"It seems likely to be-" said he.
cts foundations are broad and we'll
laid. These facts, of course, make
for greatest. We may almost say
that man himself is governed by cir
cumstances.
"What is the value of the farm
products this year?" he was asked.
eight billions ?"
Correct, he answered. 1T might
as we'll have been sixteen billions, or
twenty-four billions. We haven't be-
gun to till our soil. We don't know
how. We have merely scratched the
surface. And we are robbing our
land. Every year the crops are
smaller. It's all one way-every-
body taking out and few putting
back. The land needs to be fertilized.
Crops need to be rotated. We ought
not to plant the same things every
year.
what this country needs more
than anything else is an adequate
system of agricultural colleges. The
farmers ought to be taught how to
farm. The farmers of other countries
know more than we do. The land of
England has been titled for thous-
and years, but it is producing more
wheat to the acre than most of ours is.
It's the same in France, Germany,
Belgium and Holland, while the little
Japanese till their few acres with an
intelligence equaled no other place in
the world
"Then you believe Horace Gree
ley's advice to young men to &c West
is still good?"
Gas good as it ever was. The free
land that is good for anything is pref
ty nearly all gone, but there is lot of
good land that may be had cheaply."
do you believe the West offers
better opportunities for a young man
than the East ?"
eyes, if he will work and be pa
tent"
"You mean that in the course of
time he could become well-to- do
farmer?"
That's it."
''But what, if any, are opportuni-
ties in the West for man who is not
content merely to be moderately cir
cumstanced farmer? What could
young man do who had SIS, 900? Is
there room in the West for another
Hill?"
"There is room in the West for all
the Hills who can get there. And it
doesn't require S., 900 to start. 1
know a man who went to the State
of Washington twelve years ago with
not much more than 1000. He
bought forty acres of land and put it
into fruit. He could sell his land to-
day for $Ioo, 900. A good fruit
orchard often is worth So, 500 an acre.
"But fruit is only one of the many
things in which there is money. Back
here in the East we know little of
alfalfa. Out West it is many mans
chief stock in trade. More and more
it is coming into use as food for
stock. That makes its seed valuable.
A farmer of the Sun River valley of
Montana noted the growing demand
and in 1906 risked three acres to
alfalfa and let it ripen. He sold the
seed for $375. And if one wants only
hay he can get three crops a year,
aggregating five tons an acre, worth
from SIS to $40 ton.
Suppose a new farmer wants to
raise sugar beets. If he mixes brains
with his beet seed he cannot make a
mistake. Sugar beets grow in Mon
tana and many other Western States
as they do in no State farther East
bigger, sweeter, better in every way.
Many farmer got the price of his
land back the first year from the sale
of his beet crop."