El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1913-10-07
South Has Best Farms
Most Productive Soil in United
States Below MasOn-DixOn
Line
Bx Frederic J. HnsI<In
CONTINUED From Page One. }

pages from the book of European ex-
perience.
Prominent Men to Speak.
The nations best authorities on the
divers subjects with which the South
ern Commercial congress deals will be
present to use it as forum from which
to present their ideas as to what may
be done in the south to capitalize its
possibilities and to give practical dem
onstrations of what will result if the
whole section moves forward in step
with some Of its more progressive COM
munities.
Women to Take Part.
The Mobile meeting will be the first
one in which the women will figure.
A Woman's Auxiliary of the Southern
lied, and will hold its first annual con-
ventiOn- There will be addresses on
women in industry, women in religion,
women IN club work, and women of
the American countryside. Cooperation
viii also occupy the attention of the
women, and the countess of Aberdeen,
on behalf of her European sisters, viii
tell the southern women how coopera-
ton helps the women of Europe
A number of the representative of
Latin American governments in the
United States viii tell the congress what
their countries are expecting from the
Panama canal, and what they are do
ing toward getting ready for the inter
national trade expansion they expect
to share as a result of its opening.
South Has Best Crops
The field of opportunity in the south
is a rich one and the world has been
so accustomed to thinking of the south
as a region of run down plantations and
worn out soil, where the people live
from hand to mouth. that it may come
as a great surprise to be told that the
south shows a higher gross acreage
value for its crops than the remainder
of the United States According to the
crop reports of a recent year the value
of the crops of the south per acre
amounted to s17-23, while the per acre
value for the other sections of the
United States amounted to S14.07-a
difference Of % percent in favor Of
the southern farmer. These figures
were confirmed by the census inquiry
made in 1900. That inquiry showed
that returns from farming, based on
the value of farm values. was p per-
cent in the south and Is percent in
the other sections of the country
Longest Coast Line Here.
The south has a longer coast line
than all of the rest of the United States
together. This gives it opportunities
for more cOmmOdious harbors and bet
ter shipping facilities than any other
two-thirds of all the navigable rivers
are found there. If the navigable
rivers which pass through its territory
and are accessible to its steamboats, be
that $4,000 miles of the 1000 miles of
navigable river waters in the United
States are at its command. When the
inland waterway improvement policy
that the opening of the Panama canal
promises to put into effect is carried
forward to a successful elimination
the south will have one of the finest
systems of inland waterways in the
world.
Rich in Water Power.
No part of the country is richer in
waterDoWer than the southern states
New England has developed less than
100000 horsepower in its industries
yet this has made the New England
states one of the Industrial centers of
the earth. The officials of the South
ern Commercial congress call attention
to government statistics which show
that the south has 5000 600 horsepower
running to waste.
Congress Is to Be Permanent.
The Southern Commercial congress
desires to be an all the year round in
sttution serving as a clearing house
between those without and those with
in. It desires to show the outside
world where it may find safe invest
ment of its capital in the south, and
to show the jewellers in Dixie how much
they can do with their own resources
It seeks to bring into the southern
states an infusion of that sort of i'm
migrant blood that makes for civic and
material progress wherever it flows
Tomorrow: Ready-Madel Garments
for Women