The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1916-02-24
Speaking About Fence Posts.

ing and fence posts and in pursuit o
the investigation gathered data from
several thousand farmers on the cos
and life of fence posts. Usage Orang,
average to last about 80 years, locus
90, cedar 20, white cedar IL, burr
oak Is, and concrete 4S years.
Now the astonishing thing tt
some of us who used to split burr
oak posts that solu for cents apiece
is that burr oak should be given Sc
low a place on the list. Why burr
oak post was considered some post ir
those days after the true red cedar
had been used up-not the red cedar
of this day which isn't clear at all
but the good old fashioned red cedar
that is patched up into boxes for mi.
lady's boudoir nowadays and costs
like sam hill when it has a brass
hasp and a strip or two Of brass rib.
bon nailed to it. In those ancient
days red cedar was red cedar and
lasted longer than most folks stayed
on one farm. And locust, good black
locust, stayed in the ground sturdily
opposed to the rubbing of warbled
cattle in the spring and kept the
fence horse high and bull strong for
an Ordinary lie llluc.
The fencing proposition is utterly
different now. Then man either
bought red cedars or made his own
locust posts from the strip of locust
trees along the turn row at the back
of the field; or perhaps he sent a man
into the wood lot-mOst of the prairie
farms had an acre or two or more
purchased fer firewood and posts
down in the grove-and started him
making posts Of the white oaks and
burr oaks at cent apiece for the
making. Then he bought pine fenc-
ing six inches wide, an inch thick and
sixteen feet long to nail on when the
posts were set. When it was COM
pleted he had fence of clear lum-
Der five boards high with posts every
eight feet that was the pride of his
heart and that did the business.
Those were the days when great
RATS floaled their acreage of pine
logs down the Mississippi to every
town along the river and the fencing
described sold at STA per M. What in
calculable miles upon miles of board
came the certain shortage of such
lumber. The good red cedar had
been split into posts and sawed into
shingles. Somebody started smooth
wire. Ihe post question was still
solved by the wood lots however. Per-
haps he had to descend from white
oak to red oak and take a sprinkling
of butternut and walnut but he got
his posts from the woods mostly.
And he bored holes in them and ran
wires through and stretched them
and hadn't much of a fence after he
had finished. II wouldn't stand the
pressure. Then some genius twisted
a barb about the wire and the job
was done. That fence turned any
thing. 1t also cut the legs of half
the horses on the place and cost as
much in that way by depreciation of
their value as it cost in the first
place to erect. And then the wood
lot played out and the lumber yard
furnished the posts, big round white
and "red" cedar that were mighty
good posts. Little by little the dia-
meter of these posts diminished.
But before this the Usage orange
hedge haL been abroad in the land.
He grew the plants and contracted to
plant and bring to maturity an i'm
fence at dollar a rod. In
northern Illinois and elsewhere the
hedge multiplied. If they were we'll
kept and tended they justified all the
claims of their promoter. A good
thick set of Usage orange hedge was
harder to pass than civil service ex-
animation. But neglected they grew
ligh and in twenty years thickened
nto possible fence posts. And when
he hedge had been hacked down at |
he expense of bloody hands and bent |
md dented piety those posts set in
he ground were as nearly immutable
% decay as anything wooden ever
vas.
That's the way we came up to 25
,r 80 cent Usage orange posts, 25 to
80 cent locust posts and so on. We
tie our cake and thus haven't it. Per-
laps it was all right at that. This
great domain that is the trans Missis-
ippi was to be developed. To what
better use could the pines in Wiscon-
lin and the posts on it's buttes have
,een put? And here we are at con-
rete fence posts that cost an aver
lge of 80 cents and last half cen
ury.
This is the cement age. 1t came to
supply the place Of the cake We had
eaten, the things at our hands that
We used. We shall use it more and
more. We shall have to. Moreover
We are building fences and houses
md barns and highways to last. The
period of pioneering is over. We are
settling down to solidity and perma-
fence and to stay where we are well
IF. We shall make cement fence
POSTS and use them, make cement
'oads and use them, buy common ev-
Try day posts where the fence is to
'e temporary, lay gravel where the
lost of maintenance indicates it as
AVAILABLE, build concrete bridges to
asst like the "aul bridge of Ayr" and
generally adopt the things we have
md can use best to our best uses.
The whole thing summed up in two
words, progress and evolution
Times-Republican.
St. Louis Republics Free Offer.