The Delta independent., 1911-01-20
E. W. TAYLOR WRITES ABOUT
DELTA FOR The RED KOOk
Interesting Article Which Appeared
In January Number OF
Railroad Magazine.

Headed Delta Doins,'' the arti-
Gle follows:
Under a headline ismilar to that
above you will find in the country
papers paragraphs which read ike
this:
Jim Jones harvested his apple
crop last week. He reports that he
received net for the product OF
ten acres, $4,000
bill Smith has just finished dig
ging his potatoes. Bill will rellze
about $500 an acre for his crop"
Jack Brown did not have as
good luck as usual with his peaches
this year. He finds that his average
returns will only be bout $500 per
acre. When he doesen't make $7OO
an acre he considers it poor year.
Way back east where Jim Jones
and Bill Smith and Jack Brown
came from originally, the people
still think of Colorado as a place
where the red shirted miner-who
ever saw a miner with red shirt,
by the way?-starts out and wan
ders over the hills until he strikes
it rich If any one of the trio made
million by this method there
would be no one to dispute his as
sertion.
However, when you tell them that
Colorado is the greatest fruit grow
ing STATE in the Union and unat ou
rlend Jim Jones has got something
safer and surer with his Irul, rancn,
safer, surer and more profitable than
any mine, they will smile knowingly
and say who's lying now?
That is the great difhculty in writ
ing an article on Delta county. Any
person who tells the real truth is
pound to be called a prevaricator
oy those who have not been
on the ground and seen for them
selves the wonders of the country.
A quarter OF a century ago few
Indian tepees marked the site OF
the city of Delta. 1t was part of
big Indian reservation which was
first thrown open for settlement in
lSS4. The only farming that was
done was in the valley where the
squaw raised enough barley to sup
ply their pressing needs. The mesas.
with their thousands of fertile acres
which stood above the Uncompah-
gre valley were barren and cnculti-
waited.
hn
men and an occasional farmer. One
OF the farmers brought with him
from his old home in Missouri q
dozen yorng fruit trees. He imme-
diately became the joke of the COM
mrnity.
"Haw, haw," laughed the wise
ones. who is fool enough to think
you can raise spples and peaches in
the Rocky .1ountain country"
We will now blithely jump over the
Intervening reriod of years, with
their stories of hardship and strug-
) gle and see where Delta stands
today.
1t is a thriving city of about 5000
prosperous inhabitants. Ii is the
county esat of county which has
the record OF growing and shipping
= pore fruit tnan any other district in
the United States. The first fruit
: = trees planted by the settler who
was ridiculec, are alive and produ-
/ cling crops each year. His name, by
: the way. is w. S. Coburn, and If
d you want to verify these facts. all
you have to do is to write him a
letter. The average life of peach
: tree in the East is twelve years.
Mr.. Coburn's Elbertas are twenty
five years old and still vigorous.
: Delta lies in the Uncompahgre
= valley, at the junction of the Gun
, nison and Uncompahgre rivers. II
' is surrounded by mesas, once barreI
e but now immensely productive. The!
n are made fertile by network OF
r bitches and irrigation systems. And
r it is the boast of the Delta people
e that nowhere in the state is there
a better supply. Just to help things
along, the Government has spent s
e trifie of s5.O00.000 in building the
Gunnison tunnel, which furnishe:
part of the water which Delta uses
for irrigation.
Even the people of Colorado, save
those who live in the fruit growing
g districts, have not yet fully realized
: the greatness of such counties as
:, Delta. Just for an illustration. nov
n would you believe that In the year
Z 1909 Delta produced more apples