The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1912-05-30
MARSHALL N. DANA
TELLS OF ORCHARDS

In recent issue of the Portland Or
egon Journal, Marshall N. Dana, who
visited the valley with C. II. Lane, of
the United Staets department of agri-
culture, who is touring Oregon in the
back to the soil movement, writes the
following concerning the orchards:
Would you be wealthy? Go to Hood
River and live.
Does a fortune in scenery that cannot
be copyrighted monopolized. grabbed
or grated attract you2 Go to Hood
River and spend the day.
Miles of orchards drifted white with
bloom as though the snow fields of
Mount Hood had been lifted from peak
TO valley, warmed with the breath of
spring and tinted with the sunrise, is
the seasons earliest view.
A green valley of green trees, shell.
tered by mountains, shading the rush.
ing river, waits the beauty seeker now.
little later and days of sunshine
VIII give their gold to the Yellow
Newtown and nights OF frost will sting
the color into the ruddy cheeks Of the
Spltzenburgs, the furrowed ground be-
tween the trees will be creased with
wagon wheels and ladders of the pick
ers will press agains the branches.
This gives yet another view.
Not until the writer made an "apple
blossom trip" to Hood River recently
did he learn that the body and breath
OF Mount Hood gave flavor, substance
and color to the apples OF the famous
valley. The iron of the soil, its chem
ical constituency and volcanic fertility.
are all from the mountain of personal
ity, as is the breeze that blows down
the canyon at night bringing the frost
from the never melting snow which
the alchemy of nature transmutes into
the color of the fruit.
All of Hood River valley is a beauty
place. That is why it has become SO
popular to hundreds of Sunday excur-
sionists out of Portland. Those who
have travelled by rail through the gorge
OF the Columbia, who have tried to
measure the height of the rock wall
that bars entrance to the valley except
foI the narrow cleft worn by the river.
have no idea of the beauty of scenery
that lies just beyond.
IL is sort of mountain top valley.
at that. The best of the town is hid
den by the old oaks that grow between
the handsome homes atop Of the Hill
The elevation of the orchards is not
great, but even so, they seem much
higher than the river that broils and
t0ams in its narrow bed.
The first trees were planted near the
low mountains that must be crossed in
reaching Mount Hood. The land was
homesteaded. Some sandy country to-
ward the mouth of the river was re-
lected as unsuited for fruit-or any
thing else. Science has since helped
the planters and yearly, the orchards
reach farther up the mountain sides
and they have completely covered and
made a highly productive area out of
the sandy acres.
In Harvey county 1000 acres is not
very much of a ranch. In Hood River
100 acres is almost a prince estate.
The difference is in production. There
fore, the first sentence of this article
needs little qualifying.
To be wealthy in apple growing is
exceedingly possible as some hundred
Hood River instances prove. But when
the land. planted, sells from $500 to
$1,000 an acre, or more, a httle of the
wealth, apparently, must have been
made elsewhere. And. in fact, it has