The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1911-08-15
SETTLING THE DESERT
CONTINUED from page one.)

&c
combinations to get the best prices
and to raise the best products. This
is already being done in the fruit re
gions. There viii also be financial
combinations of the settlers TO es-
tabIish factories in their various com
munities.
Libraries and Schools.
The schools which have already
been started upon these projects are
far above the average Of those in the
country districts in other parts OF the
United States. In most cases they
pare with the schools of the
cities. Most of the GASES have what
is known as centralized graded
schools, to which the children are
brought in carriages hat go daily
from farm to farm and collect them.
Great care is taken in selecting the
teachers, and a high school education
may be gotten without leaving the
farm.
Among the interesting features of
these schools are the gardens and lit
tie farms connected with them. The
children learn practical agriculture by
raising plants, fruits and grains,
prizes being given for the best work.
The teaching is all in the spirit of
the farm, and its aim is TO make the
children love the farm and to have
them stay on it. In the past the coun-
try schools have been managed by
city teachers, who have taught the
children to despise agriculture and
tried to make them leave the farms
for the city.
AS to the schools already estab-
lished on the project at Carlsbad, n
M, 500 children are enrolled. The
graded school building is OF brick.
a in a large park, and the town
has recently erected a ffteen-hundred
doIlar-high school. Belle Fourche, in
South Dakota, has two graded schools
and a high school, While in Sturgiss
there is a public graded school with
a large attendance. Nearby are the
University of South Dakota, the state
School Of Mines, and a State Normal
school. In Huntley. in northern Mon
facilities, and the same is true Of
the other projects of the lower yell
lowstone valley. The pupils are
taught for nine months in each year,
and the State course of study pro-
vides for the teaching of agriculture
in the -four highest grades.
In Yakima the best of common
facilities are to be found in
every part of the irrigated regions.
There are graded schools and high
schools at Ellensburg, %Sunnyside and
at Tx L /
place, in addition to the public
schools, there are a business college,
a school Of music and art and a
academy for girls. In all of /
these projects nine months of school
is the rule.
Towns Of the Gases.
Nearly every one of these reclama-
ton projects has several towns which
are rapidly springing into being. In
the Yakima valley they are situated
the government lands and in the
adjoining. North Yakima
has over $4,000 people, S~unnyside has
500, Ellensburg $500 and PrOsser
600. In ADDITION to this there are
umbe of other towns and villages.
Most of these places have graded
streets bordered with trees kept alive
irrigation. They have gas and
electric lights and good telephone +,
They publish newspapers.
Yakima has a public library
which cost $50, 900. a courthouse
$4,000, and the Government
there at a cost of a quarter of d mil
ion.
The chief town in the Umatilla pro-
|ect is HerfnistOn, which already has
500 people, including a large number
Of farmers who live there and drive
% and from their farms. The place
several big business blocks. two
lumber yards. an NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
public school building, and there