The St. Lucie County tribune. (Fort Pierce, St. Lucie County, Fla.) 1905-1920, 1910-02-18
IMMIGRATION
TO THE SOUTH
Writer in Golfers Predicts that
Movement Will Exceed West
GO SOUTH YOUNG man
These Would be The Words OF Horace
Greedy We're he Alive To-day to View
the Opportunities Here Offered

In the Southern number of Golfers
Weekly appears an article by Clarence
n. Poe in which the writer predicts that
the South will be next West and the
expansion which began in the West 20
years ago is now being duplicated IN the
South.
1t is easy enough to make such an
assertion. the next thing is to prove it.
This the Golfers Weekly writer does
by many statements OF fact, a sample
of which is as follows: =.
"Go West, young man," said Horace
Greeley half century ago. go South
Young man." would be his message If
he were alive today, and with even
more reason than that on which his
former advice was based. For in the
South today are pioneer Opportunitles,
without pioneer privations. 1t lisa land
old enough to have all the advantages
of well-rOunded civilization, and yet
without industrial possibilities as dazzl-
ing as those of the the Golden West TO
which Greeley called attention; :,
The average acre OF land IN the ooutn
today sells for only One-third as much
as land of the same fertility in the
West. and as surely as water seeks to
it's own level, so surely will these lands
values also adjust themselves. Only
this week there has come to me the
complaint of an Indiana man who is
making only thirty bushels of corn on
land worth $500 an acre. A few weeks
ago rode from my office to see a field
of North Carolina corn which produced
22e bushels per acre-and twas Dougnt
within decay for $2O.5S! Within four
miles of my Office M. w. A. Slmpklns
made two and one-half bales OF cotton
per acre last year 1.-THE seed and lint
from this quantity is now worth about
S25O) on land he bought few year
ago for less than 500 per acre, If the
value of buildings are considered.
The worlds record for corn yield Is
held by South Carolina; the next hlgh-
est record is that of the North Carolina
farmer to whom have just referred,
and have before me now photograph
of Virginia boy in knee breeches VINO
made l22 bushels per acre this year az
a cost of 14A cents bushel: SO we
are finding out at last that the South
can compete with the corn belt itself
growing corn; with the DETERMINATION
of the cattle tick we shall find that we
can compete with any other section OF
American growing stock.
With milder climate and a longer
growing season than any other section
enioys, we are able to grow every CROP
of the North and Weston my home
farm corn, wheat, oats, cotton, peanuts
and tobacco are cultivated land IN ad'
dition to all this, the South has mono
poly of what is today the most proht'
able staple crop on earth; the Southern
farmers pockets now bullying witt
nearly billion dollars received for nj;
1909 cotton alone. with proper at
tention to stock raising and legumt
growing YOU can in six or seven years
make your Southern lands worth Sl0'
per acre." declared Secretary of Agrl
culture Wilson to me last spring, ant
there is no more alluring agricultural
opportunity in America than that OF
; taking $40 or $50 Southern land and IN
creasing it's value FIVE or ten-folds IN
decade, besides making good proht'
while doing it,
This is what the South, with only
two-fifths of it's land cleared and under
cultivation. offers to Northern ant
Western farmers, and it is small won
der that thousands of them are coming
to Texas and Florida, while Other. states
will soon get their quota OF this bes
class of immigrants.
And this argument-this state OF fac
could be multiplied many times over
The only thing of which the Sout
now stands in need is people-mor
|, people. 1t was people-lots OF them
J that made the West People more o
them-will make the South. We hay
, the climate, the soil resources, the de
mand for the products of the soil, an,
, everything else all these things lac
is development. And all that is neces
f sary for development is the requls't
, number of people to accomplish it.
Golfers can say nothing too strOni
, in support of the South's resources
soil and climate for even the marvelou
=. development which the West has under
. gone in the past 20 years cannot begl
: to approach the great development
/ which the South will experience in eve
B less time if we can only get sufficler
4 people to do the work.
ANTI CAI00M IEAClIf