The Rice belt journal. (Welsh, Calcasieu Parish, La.) 1900-19??, 1916-05-05

vast area of pasture lands roamed
by the longhorned cattle and Creole
ponies into one of the finest agri-
cultural countries in the world.
The assessors figures for 1888 show
that there were in cultivation in Cal
casieu parish, which embraced the
present Calcasieu, Beauregard, Allen
and Jefferson Davis parishes, 1855
acres all told, of this total 1884 acres
were in rice and $685. acres in corn.
The report of the assessor of JEFF
ferson Davis parish, for 1915 shows
190,376 acres classed as rice land at
least $4,000 of which is in actual
cultivation. We have in jefferson
Davis parish 6,687 acres classed corn
land at least $500 of which is in ac-
tual cultivation. Thus we see that
notwithstanding Jefferson Davis par
ish has had less than one-fifth of
the area of Calcasieu had in 1888 she
has in cultivation about as much corn
and more than forty times as much
rice as the whole territory. To some of
US who have been here through prac-
tically ell this growth it seems incred-
; ible that we have reached such pro-
portions. Land values have steadily
advanced but not out of proportion
to the other developments. In let
ter written from Jennings by the late
s. L. Cary in 1885 he states "That
people from the north principally from
Iowa had acquired a block of land 6
X "a miles in the vicinity of Jennings
| by homestead generally and that there
was yet much land about here sub
ject to entry besides large amount
of Spanish Grant that could be bought
for 1926 to 81 per acre." At this
time, ! think a few good farms could
be bought as low as SIS per acre and
the price ranges from that to about
$50 depending on location and i'm
proyements.
So far as | am able to learn the
first public road ever laid out in this
parish was in 1887 and passed through
the town of Welsh from north to
south. Since then the question Of
roads has been one that has interest
ed us continually. We now have as
near as can be calculated about 6OO
miles of laid out roads in the parish
upon which we have expended with
the last year the sum of S31, 1871
land At this time there is a PROPOSE
ton before our people to authorize
the issuance of 100000 in bonds to
further improve our roads. With the
improvement of roads has also come
the adoption of modern methods OF
TRANSFORMATION and travel instead OF
the two wheeled OK cart of 30 years
ago we now have four-wheeled wa
CONS drawn by good horses and mules
and some of our farmers are already
using motor trucks and many others
/ will as soon as we shall have surfac-
ed our roads. Instead of the Creole
pony being the principle method OF
travel very large per cent OF our
| farmers as we'll as town people now
travel in automobiles.
| At the time of which we write there
was in the territory now Jefferson
Davis Parish probably not to eX-
coed 100 children in the schools all
of which were poorly organized. The
public school property consisted of g
few rude shacks with cheapest make,
| shift for equipment. In this parish
we now have five high schools, di'
ploma from which entities its holder
to entrance into any institution Of
learning in the state and practically
all of the rural schools of the parish
/ 1850 pupils and the total value o.
school property is $124,822.35, A
school census of the parish shows
that we now have a population O
$4,000. These people have come
from almost every state in the umoI
and some foreign countries.
1 The time was and not many year
since when man here was neither
Kaian or q Yankee depending as t
whether he spoke French Or Engilsh
When the people from other states
, principally from the north began set
Ting this country about the only thinI
the average native could see in it wa
that they were being deprived o
their lands and that their stock rang
i, es were being encroached upon an
they naturally resented the intrusion