Omaha daily bee., 1912-10-20
z.t1k1.zIII1Il
lzzzzuz
(g)

proof; here 1t is According to
the valuation of all farm property (including
land) furnished by the United States census of
1910, Nebraska ranks fourth in total valuation
of all farm property, being exceeded by Illinois,
Iowa and Texas alone. Texas has S6 times the
area of Nebraska, with only fraction more of
reported farm wealth, which excludes it from
competition for place at this time. Nebraska
possesses one-twentieth of the entire farm
wealth of the United States, according to the
government figures
In the group of four midwest states border
ing on the Missouri river-Iowa Missouri, Ne
braska and Kansas-Nebraska ranks second in
agricultural wealth now visible and taxable,
while this group of four states contains full
one-fourth of the entire agricultural wealth of
the nation. In the great Transmissouri terri
tory Nebraska possesses a farm wealth now so
great as to place it beyond competition for
generation to come. This is the heart of the
agricultural empire of the greatest agricultural
country on earth. Nebraska-but yesterday in
the Great American Deserts now seated be-
yond competition on the throne of empire.
Nebraska Ranks Third
The wonderful wealth concentrated on the
farms of this prairie commonwealth will bear
closer analysis. The total farm wealth of Me-
braska as returned by the last census is $2079,-
819 900; the returns of taxable property upon
the farms and statistics of crop production for
the last year as given by the State Bureau OF
Labor and Industrial Statistics give the total
farm wealth of Nebraska as $2,31S,448,445,
placing it third in rank among the states Of the
union.
The actual farm population of Nebraska in
1910, excluding all residents of towns, cities and
villages, was 62S40S; this is an average per
capita wealth for the farm population of $4,000,
or SIS, 900 per family of five now resident on
the farms of Nebraska. The per capita wealth
of the United States as a whole is reckoned at
$1,000; therefore, the average visible wealth of
the Nebraska farm family of five persons is
$4,000 more than the average of families in
the United States as a whole.
This enormous accretion of wealth-enor-
nous beyond the power of mind to conceive
has come into existence within the memory OF
men yet young by the application of native in
dustry to the wondrous fertility of the greatest
body of perfect agricultural soil in the western
hemisphere. It Is a story more wonderful than
the tales of Arabian Nights, surprising in actual
achievement the widest flights Of fancy
Riches Beyond the Dreams of Midas
A recent magazine article says ut is the
enormous increase of the output of the wonder
full mines of the Rand, in South Africa, that Is
chiefly responsible for the gain in the worlds
total production of gold during the last few
years. Those mines in one year have yielded
no less than $175,O0OOOO of the precious sub
stance and the stream of gold from that source
is steadily gaining in volume There
is good reason to believe that ten years from
now the yield of the Rand deposits will reach
$500, 900, 900"
But in Nebraska last year the production
of wealth In corn wheat and poultry exceeded
the flow of gold from the Rand, while the golden
flood that pours from its farms into the mar