Arizona republican., 1910-05-26
HUGE DESERT LAND FILINGS S3,000 Acres Taken Up For
 Irrigation Projects RENEWED DEVELOPMENT Little Colorado Project Gets 30,00O and Col. w. c. Green 50,000-Work on Frog Tank Project Soon to Begin.
RENEWED DEVELOPMENT

There has never been a time in the history of Arizona when the imme-
 diate reclamation of the arid lands of i the territory was as promising as il is I at the preesnt moment. A new recla- nation project on the Little Colorado
 river will be initiated today by the ! filing at the local land office on 30.
 coo acres of land in Navajo and Apache counties; by the filing yester- | day on 5O,000 acres of land for Colonel | ". c. Greene, between Maricopa and ! Casa Grande. that project alreaGy un- ! derway, will be materially advanced:
 the santa Fe road has filed for patent. ' list of selections of railroad lands | amounting to 42.O0O acres on the Cok | orado river which has been sold to a Los Angeles development company to | be used as a cotton plantation. Ana | in addition to it all the news has been ! given out that Walter H. Beardsley \ has succeeded in financing the Frog Tang project on the Agua Fria river | and that work will begin there in a very short space Of time.
 The two filings amounting alto | gether to about S3.G00 acres, were
 made by representatives of the Santa 1 Ee road They were made with Moqui | reservation script. In the one instance,
 that of the land filed on for Colonel | Greene, the Sant3 Fe gave mp land in | it's own district to promote % rvcldma- | ton project in tine territory adjacent | to the lines cf the Southern Pacific. 1 The acreage extends south of the i Southern Pacific tracks between Mar | icopa and Casa Grande. The project | l-,ll mean perhaps q reservoir for tho | overflow from the santa Cruz river or the utilization of the underground cur rents
 The project on the Little Colorado is l located chiefly in Apache county north
 of St. Johns and runs as far west as
 the petrified forest. The men behind
 it are j. II. Sherman and J. r. Church
 of Denver. capitalists who have al most unlimited backing. The land was | filed on by the Santa Fe and will be ! turned over to these men for reclama | tion. The waters of the Little Colo
 rado will be utilized to irrigate 100000 | acres of land. Sherman and Church | estimate lHt cost or lllt MOIh dl d
 million and a half of dollars. These men were induced to come down and 1 look over the situation by r. T. Tucker | owner of the Long IT ranch. man who is thoroughly familiar with the
 country and its possibilities for re- l clamation. Both Sherman and Church ! are men of ample means and business | ability and well aware of the magni-
 tude of the work they are about to | undertake.
 Attempts at retaining the Little l Colorado district were first made by | MormOns They failed to accomplish
 much on account of lack of funds and
 sold out a line of reservoir sites to | Church and sherman. Then some | weeks ago the same men purchased | from the Santa Fe some fifty-six sec
 tions Of land and with the 20,000 acres | which they have now acquired VIII i have reclamation district one-third as large as the Salt River valley. The Rio Colorado Land and Irriga- | ton company is concern made up | principally of Los Angeles capitalists. | They purchased 4. .O00 acres of land ] from the Santa Fe road and this has
 been filed for patent to secure the title The land is opposite the Needles
 and extends north from the railroad ! track to Ft. Mojave. In this fertile Arizona valley the Californians pro | pose to create an enormous plantation | for the cultivation of cotton and trop- ical plants of many varieties.
 The Frog Tank project is on the Agua Fria just south of the Maricopa | county boundary line. A dam and res
 ervoir on Agua Fria at this point would impound water sufficient to ir- | rigate d large tract of land A diver sion dam was built there some years ago and $260.000 spent on it but it has never been put in working shape. | It is now asserted that Beardsley, who | is at present in the east will soon re- | turn to the valley and begin york on ! the project. He so stated in conVer- sation recently with a prominent busi-
 ness man of the territory NIr. Beard | sley said that he had the money in sight. about one million dollars, and that he would begin work as soon as | he could get competent engineers and
 make the preliminary arrangements.
 The deeds will then be put on record. | The land in the reclamation district is
 now being published and posted and embraces an area of 30,000 acres. About 500 acres have also been se-
 lected by the Santa Fe for the use of
 Messrs Holzinger and Barringer in the
 development of the Meteor mine.