Evening star., 1909-09-04

do it If the people OF Boise would pay the
cost, which he estimated at S250,G00. A
few weeks later they handed him the
cash. but he refused it, saying that the
company would lay track over there at
its own expense. The money was raised
by subscription. Everybody in town con-
trlbuted and each of the banks gave 10
per cent of it's capital stock Mr. Harri-
man came out here afterward and after
making a personal examination declared
that the engineers should have laid the
original line through the city, because ii
would have given them cheaper construc-
ton and better grade.
1t is singular fact. however. that since
the road was built Boise has added more
to its population than all the towns on
the main Oregon Short Line in Idaho.
Agriculture Chief Source of Wealth.
The principal source of wealth now and
in the future. will be agriculture. The
Boise river flows through the county in
le!surely manner, with an abundance
or water which never fails, and for more
than a quarter of a century the farmers
living along the bottoms have built their
own irrigating bitches in their own way
and have produced phenomenal crops of
all the cereals except corn, alfalfa, clover.
timothy and other forage plants: potatoes
and other vegetables, sugar beets berries
and fruits OF all kinds, especially apples
and prunes The prunes of Idaho are
try and command the highest prices,
while the apples of Boise valley sell from
S15O to $3.50 a box at the railway sta
tons for shipment to the east. A large
part OF the crop is exported. Last season
3o5 carloads of apples; 312 carloads of
prunes. II carloads of pears and 80 car
loads of other fruits, representing a mill
lion dollars in value, We're shipped from
this station.
Inauguration Of Irrigation.
Boise valley was one of the first loca-
tions in the United States to be irrigated,
and but for the lack of faith and enter
prise on the part of a syndicate of east
ern capitalists 1t might have been a
bonanza to them. Arthur D. Foote, the
husband of Mary Hallock Foote, the
novelist, was the father of irrigation In
this part of the country. He came here
in 1882 to represent the New York Ditch
Company, which proposed to spread the
1t was a large and wealthy syndicate,
promoted by Mr.. Tompkins, who in
vented and owned the diamond drill.
Foote laid out a great scheme which COM
pretended almost everything that has
since been done here in the way of agri-
culture and horticulture. but people laugh
ed at him. They said he was crazy. None
but an insane man would ever suggest that
barren desert. a lifeless bed of lava,
such as covered the valley Of the Boise
river would ever produce crops. Boise
was a mining district, and agriculture
was considered impossible except on a
few scattered spots of land along the
river bottom, where the farmers could
build their own bitches The stockholders
of the New York Ditch Company ac-
cepting the popular theory, allowed Mr..
Foote to spend half million dollars and
then refused to put up any more money.
They abandoned everything and charged
up previous expenditures to their own
folly.
Mr.. Foote then went to the geological
survey at Washington, and in 1887 sub
mitted a report with recommendations
concerning the reclamation of the lands
in Boise valley. but 1t received no atten-
Three years ago the engineers of the
session of the bitches abandoned by the
New York company and are now carrying
out the recommendations made by Mr..
Foote twenty-five years ago. In the
meantime Mr.. Foote went to California
and has met with conspicuous success in
the development of the North Star mine
in Grass valley. near Sacramento. Mrs.
Foote has told the story Of her husband S
experience here in a novel entitled THE
Chosen Valley" Her most popular stories
are Occur d Alene.' the plot of which
involves a strike that occurred in the
mines up there several years ago: John
Bowdoin's Testimony and a mining
story called The Led Horse Claim.
Some Notable Buildings.
There are several notable buildings in