Arizona republican., 1912-05-27
OF
 DESERT ACRES
Water Supply Being Devel- oped for @ Large Tract Near Maricopa; Possibili- ties of Beet Culture in Casa Grande Valley

the enterprise of R. P Davie. J. R. Mckinnie and William Price of Colo rado Springs, and all well known here, in acquiring for exploitation a tract of twenty sections of desert land in the vicinity of Maricopa. These men are all well known as hustlers who have done much in the development of natural resources and who have made their money by turn ing to account what were waste places on the earth until given the benefit of their enterprise The particular land in question is in itself not more attractive to an investor than that in a thousand other places in Arizona that will some day be the scene of similar operations, but it was the one that just at that time for various reasons appealed to these gentlemen, and it will be with interest that the public will learn of the success of their exploitation. A plan for the reclamation of the land has been worked out and the property sold to C. M. M. Crichton of Altadena, Cal, E. Howard of London and the Earl of Rothers, of London and Scotland. These gentlemen are possessed of am pie means to carry out the reclama- ton project and are now engaged in doing the preliminary work.
 The land lies three miles east of MaricOpa in the Santa Cruz bottom. which is merely a depression in the desert so slight the ordinary traveller would not notice it. It is in a com pact body, one section being south nf n nf Do
 cific railroad and the rest of it on the north side of the railroad thus giving any future settlement upon it ideal transportation on a main over land route. one of the things that comments that particular patch of desert more than some others at this time It is likely though that similar conditions can be found in many places in Arizona now and in the years to come when more railroads criss cross the country there will be scores of such tracts available for reclamation. only the necessary money and enterprise being needed
 Messrs. Davie and associates afore- mentioned, did not steal the land nor undertake to homestead it but merely took a little good American money and bought scrip with which they ac- quired the land with a good private ownership title, after which they were in a position to do what they pleased with it. But they are not the sort of men who bury their talents in the sand, and they had their plans in view all the time, having first satis- fled themselves of the existence of an abundant water supply below ground, within easy pumping distance. This too, is another thing that time and invention will improve for. the recla- nation of Arizona lands-namely cheaper pumping power and improved pumping devices, as demonstrated by the many advances made along those lines in the last twenty years. With present day facilities one can pump today, profitably. from much greater depth than q few years ago.
 The new owners have bought the l land contingent only upon the devel- Opment of water and that develop ment is now practically accomplished The first well was planned for depth of 320 feet, eighteen inch casing and is now over 200 feet. At the depth of 150 feet the well was producing 800 gallons per minute It will be sunk to it's planned depth in all prob ability, making that much of a res ervOir against the pumping drain. It is planned to have d large central | power plant near the railroad where the fuel cost will be the lowest pos sible and transmit power from that point to pumping plants on different i sections of the tract as they shall be installed
 l The plans of the new owners of the l land are not yet matured as to how l they will utilize the land,s or at least
 have not been made public. It may | be conducted as one vast estate or | company farm, or it may eventually l be cut up into small holdings and
 sold to individual owners, in which event it would develop into another l coloniZing project. About all that has been given out is that they expect t.
 clear and plant abont 20O0 acres of
 the land during the next crop season
 for an actual demonstration of it's possibilities.
 In this connection it has been au- 1 thentically reported that engineers
 representing large San Francisco cap
 
 Casa Grande valley recently with q view to securing a large tract of land for the exclusive cultivation of 1 the sugar beet. Whether such an en- ! terpriSc has been decided upon def 1 initely is not given out but it would 1 seem that the possibilities are there l for the successful development of such l an undertaking. The idea upon which l they were proceeding was that the | beet business is a good one in which 1 to specialize and there is no better l place than the Casa Grandc valley
 for the growing of the beets. It is not the plan of these promoters to | enter into general farming but to confine themselves to the work of
 raising one good crop of beets each year and let the land remain idle the
 rest of the year, or plant only such
 crops as might be desirable to re-
 fertilize the soil constantly. The req
 son is that the only present draw l back to the Casa Grande country is | the scarcity of water and the sugar l beet planted at the right time can | be grown with a minimum of water for it natures before the long dry
 summer has fairly set in. In some