Warren sheaf. [volume] (Warren, Marshall County, Minn.) 1880-current, 1909-09-16
WHAT SOME WISE MEN SAW IN
THE EAST.

After swinging round 5000 mile
circle in the Eastern United States
and Canada a party Of twenty Saint
Paul municipal officers and council
members is back again, convinced
that Minnesota as an agricultural
state need take second place to
none, and that Western cities, in spite
OF their newness as compared with
the ancient settlements of the East,
are all to the front in all that means
practical progress. The soil and crops
OF the East, while the latter are con-
sidered good, were revelation to the
Minnesota party. After visiting one
Of the best fields Of corn Northern
Indiana had to show, one Of the coun-
cilmen remarked:
That makes me homesick for
Minnesota" Why in our state they
feed that stuff to cows, and here they
think it's corn"
/ New York can teach the West some
thing in the care Of roads. Its mag.
nificent Ocean Boulevard is a gravel
led roadway, but in absolutely perfect
condition in spite Of the tremendous
traffic of carriages and autos. It is
kept perfect by the use Of a moditica-
tion of the King road drag, consisting
OF triangular frame set closely with
steel drag teeth, but the teeth are
inclined at sharp angle against the
direction in which the drag is moved.
Small wheels permit of adjustment
giving the drag very fine cut, not
more than an inch in depth. Street
sprinklers are sent ahead OF it and the
drag follows, smoothing every hum
mock and filling every depression
The cut is so slight that the following
trafnc Of wheeled vehicles makes a
hard road within an hour.
Western cities will profit largely by
what the party saw of public play
grounds in Chicago. The playground
system there is perfectly worked out,
and the grounds themselves are mag
nificently improved in a permanent
way. Concrete has been extensively
employed for all buildings, walls and
other purposes. Handball and tents
courts are provided and each has its
outdoor gymnasiums for both boys
and girls. At night the play grounds
do larger business than by day, but
but every nook and Granny is flooded
with electric light and the boys and
girls are sent home promptly at the
closing here, meanwhile they are
under the supervision of competent
care takers and instructors.
Why Eastern farmers continue t.
farm soil apparently made up
largely of boulders in various stages
of gray forbiddingness, and the COM
inonest variety of yellow sand, re.
NAMED an unsolved mystery. In
parts of Michigan alone was there to
be seen any soil which compares with
that of eighty.two large Minnesota
counties. The grain fields looked dis.
couraged when one remembered the
opulent yield Of creaIs in Minnesota
this year. There were no clusters of
grain stacks around farmhouses-two
or three seemed about the best farms
could show. The farmers were evi-
IDENTIFY not poor, yet there were no
fine barns, no large improvements to
show any recent prosperity.
On the dock at Lake Champlain a
conversation. He belived the lot Of
the farmer, complaining that the sol!
devoured fertilizer like a rat hole eat.
ing sand. that the grass crop this
year was such as to make it difficult
70 maintain his dairy heard, that ap
pies did not promise as well as thay
| should. ...s -sy...a...-.
Why do You farm here then" he
was asked. why don't you move to
Minnesota? Out there the surface sol,
IS three feet thick and farmers arr
making so much money they all rid,
in automobiles" ..-..4@
Well" he replied, my father far
med the same farm I am now on, and
ne made a living, and besides, Min
nesota Is such cold country"
| Yet Southern Minnesota this year
shows better apples than any the
party saw in the old Empire state.
Its evidently time for Minnesota to
get busy with some of the Eastern
hardheads who are trying to make
grass grow on boulders and to pro.
duce wheat from sand piles.