Abilene weekly reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1888-1935, 1909-05-20

Ex-senator Burton Points Where
Land Acquires Its Wealth.

mot a single one of San Antonio'i
magnificent resources, not her stores
and her factories. nor her beautiful
hotels which she has and which she
is building equal, in my opinion, the
the land in her own neighborhood
by economic use Of water for power
and for irrigation declared former
Senator j. r. Burton, at the st. An
thony hotel last night, in talking Of
what he emphatically believes to be
the greatest proposition before the
people of the century.
SIN your rivers. in your wells, and
in your natural rainfall" continued
Senator Burton, in pointing out pos
sibilities which await development
here, "are stores of water which need
only to be economically used upon
your land to make it yield fabulous
returns. No place on earth is better
adapted to profit by irrigation than
Southwest Texas, because you have
climate which works twelve
months in the year. Your land is
producing fancy vegetables and
fresh fruits while our farms up north
are wrapped in snow, and when we
are ready to pay almost whatever
you want to ask for your products.
Southwest Texas is realizing the
value of irrigation more than many
other parts of the country are, but
when people have learned the co.
nomic use of water for irrigation,
and such use is becoming an exact
and delicate science, one-fourth of
one-tenth perhaps of the water
which is used now will be sufficient.
Instead of letting water rush
down .ravines and crowd rivers into
foods, people are going to prevent
food damage by saving that water
where it is needed and are going to
save the wealth now lost in floods
and gain the wealth from the land.
Besides that, people are going to tap
the underground lakes and streams
more and use it more judiciously
IMAM they ever have Done before"
In the I'D" ranch deal of $4,000
acres at Fort Stockton, involving
half million dollars, and In the
Pryor "77" milhon-dollar deal for
100 ,OGO acres in Zazala county, con-
summated yesterday by the Kansas
man and his associates, Senator Bur-
ton has backed up his outspOken be-
lief that Texas lands offer the great
est opportunities open today. For
the man who works." he says, "any-
thing is possible in Southwest Texas"
Senator Burton has been studying
water for twenty years, he says. and
he maintains that 1t is the one ele-
ment by which man may become mas
ter of the world. 1t is the water and
not the land, he points out, that
makes men pay high prices for farm
ing land, and he figures to sell the
water and throw the land in.
"Air, light, land and water are
the four great elements necessary |
to all prant and animal growth"
said the Senator last night in laying |
his premise. "The air and the light
we have and cannot control, and the
and is here. Without water, man is
helpless. Give him water and he
makes the land his.
"The Anglo-saxon race has been
progressing for 1000 years without
'eally getting acquainted with water.
in the valley of the Nile hundreds
If years before Christ another race
quilt the greatest reservoir for the
Of water that the world
las ever seen, and it made those
people 50 rich that peasants ate off
yolden plates. When the American
,eopIe, the most virile race of man
hat has ever lived, masters water
IS it is beginning to do, such wealth
IS we can only dream of now will be
he result.
FLOOD damage every year is many
lines more than the damage from
ire. We have almost nothing to
,revent flood damages, but we have
pent millions to fight fire in every
,ossible way. Instead Of beginning
t the wrong end and building levees
Iown on the Mississippi to pen the
vater in after the Hood has come, as
We do now, we will learn to check
hat water hundreds of miles up,
way in Montana and Nebraska or
owa, where it starts and where 1t is
eeded. when the great rains come
re lift flood gates and store i'm
,onsa raaarvoira fuIl Of water. We