The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1911-10-24
Take Care Where You Light.
Cryptic Advice Given to Readers of The Gazette
by the Former Editor. Writes of Conditions
and Opportunities in the Far West.
BY JAMES AIKEN.

| every month OF the year. A single
item is the sugar-beet industry.
there being four large manufac-
tories of the great sacharine staple
in operation, with fifth under
contract, all but one Of them within
a ten-mile radius of Santa Ana, the
county seat. The fact that the
contract for the erection of the last
Of these big factories calls for an
expenditure Of over half million
dollars indicates the magnitude Of
! the output of the entire group
eight to ten million pounds of sugar
per year. all from Orange county
| beetS.
Saw Beets Harvested.
In the drive to Huntington Beach
few days ago ! saw the process of
harvesting the beets and hauling
them to market going on, as well
as one Of the enormous factories
and its group Of warehouses about
two miles from Huntington. The
sugar-beet and celery-growing dis
trict is not very attractive in the
point of rural beauty, but is almost
marvellous in productiveness and
value.
After coming down a hill into the
valley Thursday. | stopped a team
ster driven five or six mules attached
to big wagon. to inquire the way.
was in doubt whether the swarthy
driver was Mexican or Americana,
but soon found that he was from
Missouri. and perfectly willing to
show me other things beside the
right way home. Like most of the
residents he speedily made me aware
that his ranch was for sale that he
was offering twenty acres, with two
artesian wells and most of the land
on the bottom, all for $1,000. Point
ing to the fields of celery extending
almost as far as the eye could reach,
he said that the owner of the field
by the roadside had refused $500
per acre for twenty-acre tract,
and that the tenant who was grow
ing the celery was paying ground
rent of forty dollars per year for
every acre he leased from the owner.
While was interested, for obvious
reasons, | did not invest. &C But the
long rows of celery. some of them
flooded with water, certainly looked
nicer than the ragged fields of
beets. with swarthy laborers work
ing them. that had viewed on the
way to the beach. The beets are
planted in rows not more than
foot apart, and their culture in
wolves an immense amount of hand
labor done mainly by Mexicans and
Southern Europeans.
Plowed Out by Gangs.
AS | passed, the beets were being
plowed out by a special form of
plows in gangs drawn by four
or six-mule team. Following these
came gangs Of men armed with
heavy knives which they used in
topping or cutting off the top of
the beets, and throwing them into
sort OF wind-row. teams following
| in their wake and loading into
broad-tired wagons, which were
driven upon arched bridges spanning
the railroad running through the
beet-fields and running to the ware
houses Of the sugar factory. The
loads hauled to the top of the arch
ways are dumped Through schutes
directly into the cars (which run to
the factory.
A rancher adjoining our village,
who owns or leases three thousand
acres in q body. told me that his
sugar-beet lands down in the valley
were BY all odds the best money
makers on the tract. Nevertheless,
these beet-lands are almost destitute
OF farm buildings of any substantial
kind. the shacks of'the farm labor
ers and the warehouses being about
the only buildings INVISIBLE. Tie
families of the landowners live upon
the mesa, Or table-land:near BY.
Are Threshine the Beans.
Referring 70 other industries, i