The Mena weekly star., 1913-01-16


 it out and keep it for reference:
 How do you think of Arkansas, when you think of her at all? believe l can tell you a little more frankly than you would be willing to tell me just how you think of her. You think of her as one of the waste places, as a third-rater in industrial pretension, as a state with a green scum over it-sign of utter stagnation Isn't that pretty nearly right?
 We'll let's see how well founded that understanding is in fact. Let me assure you that there is no blue sky in what I shall say. We shall strip the matter down to bare facts. For a long time some of you have been wanting this solid infor- nation about our state, and it's high time you were getting it.
 Leads in All Production Per Acre.
 In the very beginning, consider this. We shall get back to it pres ently in detail, but I want to pre- face the story with the statement that in the value of farm products per acre. Arkansas has easily led all the great agricultural states of the Union. Further, in this ten year period. Arkansas has made a greater percentage of gain in every thing relating to agriculture than has been made in any other state of the great Mississippi valley. You don't believe that, do you? We'll get the proofs presently.
 As matter of fact, Arkansas is. to the average outsider, an un- known land. The state has been occupied almost twice as long as Iowa and Nebraska, but in that time she has builded no real rep utation The best that can be said of the publicity she has gotten for herself is that it has made her nO- tOriOus, not famous. Oklahoma, in the last l5 years, has had a dozen times more of publicity of the right sort than Arkansas has had in a century. Just about all that has been circulated relative to Arkansas has been an ineXhausLible fund of utter transformation
 Arkansas is to blame for this, of course. It is up 10 every state to tell her own story, if 1t is to be told at all. Arkansas has never done this. She has resented un- friendly comment and misunder- standing, but she has taken no pains to bring about a correct con- ception of things.
 Where Is Arkansas?
 You know what that sort of spirit begets. You have grown used to thinking of Arkansas as a place vague and remote. When it comes to a discussion of Iowa or Nebras- ka or Colorado, you can quote facts and figues. You know lots of things about Texas. Oklahoma and Texas seem to you actually nearer than Arkansas. The sum and substance of it is that'you can't quite get Ar kansas placed in your minds.
 Well, now, where is Arkansas? Let's look at her with reference to the centers of things first.
 The national center of popula- ton is in southwestern Indiana. Little Rock the capital of Arkansas, and Des Moines, the capital of Iowa. lie at almost exactly the same dis tance in miles from that center, and reach it just as quickly by rail and as quickly in time.
 You know, without word of mine, what that means The center of population stands for the center of consumption of staple products in agriculture and manufacture, or nearly so. Little Rock lies much nearer to that center than Omaha or Minneapolis or Philadelphia You don't look upon those places as remote, do you? You think Of Omaha as a close neighbor of your own, do you? Little Rock is only a few miles further from Chicago than is Omaha. It is very much nearer to you than is Philadelphia or New York No, Arkansas ism far away.
 More Navigable Rivers Than An!
 State.
 But her position is still better than that, if you consider thu broader relations. Some of these times, surer than taxes and deatl put together we shall have deer waterway to the gulf and isthmiaI canal. Arkansas eastern border i the Mississippi river, and she ha more miles of navigable waterway within her boundaries than an. other state of the Union. Yol know as we'll as I could tell yoI what that means. You-we-all O us-have been so long used t thinking of the national drift o commerce following east and yves lines that we have come to believ, there is a certain divine inevitable ness about it. But there isn't. Tn, centers of production of the grea staple foodstuffs in our nation ar, ranged, not on east-and- lines but in a strongly marked north and-south group, extending up an'