Arizona republican., 1913-05-19
BETS HAD PINE
 | APPLE ORCHARD
Picked Buds, Chased as Cones, Longed for Fruit, Mixed Cows Dry and :. Leased Himself to Goldy
 and $. F., r. & r.

A. A. Betts, traVeling freight and
 passenger agent for the Santa Fe, came
 to Arizona twenty three years ago the
 first of this month. His first active operations in the country was to buy a
 large tract of land in the mountains
 near Prescott.
 Betts spent perhaps four months
 with various real estate dealers before
 he was satisfied. He wished to get the tall pine trees, as all agents were
 agreed that the best pine apples grew
 on the large, tall trees. After climbing the trees to look for fruit-the time Betts was investigating-it was when only the buds of the fruit were on the trees, these buds were known locally as cones. After the first two days, the skin was all worn off his breast in climbing the trees, but he was assured that the balm that flowed from the trees after the bark had been worn off by the human breast, was very healing. Betts was finally satisfied with a piece of land and closed a deal with the Santa F'e for the trees he had peeled climbing. The railroad paying good prices for them for telegraph poles. on account of their being well | parked and breast polished. During his pole deal with the rail- road he won the confidence of the of ficials and they loaned him a lot of old car wheels to use on the uphill side of his mountain wagons used in trans porting his pine apples. These car wheels acted as weight to balance his 1 load but how he ever got back with his wagons he never would tell.
 When he was asked to pay school | tax he refused, on account of having 1 no children to get the benefit but the | collector insisted that it should be paid l and hinted that Betts was not too old | to attend in person as the experience 1 would do him good
 1 After he had his arrangements made | to market his crop. waiting for the fruit to ripen, he found the pine apples ] that grew in Arizona were of the cent ury plant family and had fruited just | two years previous to his settlement | on the ranch: the trees would blossom iFbut would get no further than making ilittIe brown cones and then dry up | After he was satisfied that he could 1 grow a lot of trees from seed in time
 for the next crop of pine apples, he cleared the land and made a specially l of raising umbrellas.
 Betts was counted one of the bright
 est men while around Prescott. no one | in those parts could spell a word but
 one way, Betts could do it several l ways.
 The winter his family came to Phoe- nix, he did not need all the milk his l two cows gave so he milked just ] enough to do for his coffee and thought he would have it all left when his'fam | ily came back. but for some reason both cows went dry. He came to Phoenix and bought several calves, being very | fond of calves liver. he would cut g l chunk out of a calf for breakfast an6 | would be surprised to find it dead next 1 morning He came to the conclusion that calves of that breed were not good livers.
 The following winter after Betts l bought his first pair of shoes, he froZt
 his feet and Goldie bought his interest
 in the pine apple ranch. Betts leased himself to Goldie for ninety nine years
 to pay for his (Goldie) taking the l orchard over.''
 It's an awful thing to do, but if you l want to get acquainted with Work l drop in the Santa Fe office and Betts l will introduce you and then proceed te do you up Brown.