The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-05-13
TEEE NEW SOUTH AS WAR ASSET-By Frank G. Carpenter

irgton, and also by the states and the railways
 The cry sent out for more food is af- fecting the crops of this year. We saw patches of corn, peas and beans here and there along the line, and gardens are being planted as never before. Near Atlanta we passed through the enormous
 peach orchards of Georgia which are now annually sending millions of barrels
 of fruit to the north. The Southern rail- way alone carried 5000 carloads last year. Diversified farming is needed to bring up the land and the war demand for foodstuffs will do the country permanent good. As it is, many of the farms have been cropped again and again until they seem thin and worn out, and the whole region lacks the prosperous look of the states between New York and the Mis- sissippi river. The greater part of the country is dreary to an extreme. The land washes into gulleys and the slopes must be terraced like hills of old Italy The farm scenes are different from those of Ohio. Indiana and Illinois. There are no large barns nor outbuildinss. There are no hay stacks and no silos. There are no fences of either rail or wire, and but few cattle. sheep, horses or hogs are to be seen The houses are growing bet ter. but most of them still need a coat of fresh paint. There is no grass to speak of, and the most of the land has yet to. be resown before it can be turned into the mighty meat basket that the agricultural experts say it will be when properly farmed
 Leaving Atlanta, we went downhil1 all most all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. We passed through Alabama. whose coal, iron and steel will form one of Uncle Sam's big assets in making guns, ar nor plate and similar war supplies We crossed part of the rich Mississippi del- ta. with it's vast unreclaimed swamps and stonped a New Orleans, in the very heart Of one of the coming bread lands of the United States.
 All alone the line from Washington to the mouth of the Mississippi both man and nature are jumping Tn the north the farmers are blowing and planting their cotton. and setting out patches for food supplies. Farther south the corn is well un through the ground, and here at New Orleans the sugar cane is high, and we are on the edge of the summer Everywhere the south Is alive. Most of the cotton mills are now running both day and night, and the lighted windows shine out of the darkness. Both manu- lecturers and farmers have been spurred on by the demands of the war, and more business Is being done than ever before. The same conditions prevail in all parts of the country. and plans are making which will eventually turn the south into an industrial workshop similar to that of New York and New England.
 But let me give you a bird's-eye view of what Uncle Sam has in the south. It makes one feel confident as to our suc- cess when we count up our assets and
 learn what they are. had no apprecia- ton of the extent of this part of our country until I planned out this trip. The distances are magnificent. I came 1120 miles in an almost straight line from Washington to New Orleans, and Hous- ton, Tex, where I shall make my next long stop. Is almost 800 miles farther. From there to Fl Paso, near where the western state of New Mexico begins is a 24-hour ride by fast express train, and as far away from Washington as London lis distant from Constantinople. From Baltimore to Fl Paso is almost as far as from Boston to Denver.
 The southern states number 1e. and they comprise some of the largest states of the union. Bunch them together and you have an area which equals one third of the United States proper. It embraces more than one-fourth of all the
 land under Uncle Sans flag, including Alaska. Hawaii. the Philippines and our West India Islands, with those we have just bought from Denmark thrown In. Take out Russia and the south Is greater than all the countries which are now warning Tn Europe Louisiana is twice as big as Belgium and Holland, and 1t has millions of acres of far richer soil. Texas is bigger than Germany. France or Austria Hungary. It is four times as big as New England, with 15,000 miles to spare. Kentucky is five times as large as Massachusetts, Maryland nine times as big as Rhode Island. and you could cut Florida into seven equal pieces and each would be big enough to cover New Jersey and Maryland. Alabama is bigger than Pennsylvania. and it has tens of billions of tons of coal and iron lying under it's soil I might make similar comparisons as to Tennessee, Georgia and also as to Oklahoma, which is now our greatest oil state, as well as one of the chief farming states of the union.
 Among the big problems of today Is how we can keep down Sthe prices Of clothing and food. We are short of both bread and meat, and everything I talked with MT. Bradford Knapp. who has charge of the demonstration farm work now going on in the south. He tells me that our salvation lies in this region and that with diversified farm ing 1t may be made so to increase the size of our bread and meat baskets as to greatly supply what we need fer our armies and allies.
 As it Is. the south itself has S6,000,- 900 stomachs to fill. It has one-third of the population of the United States to feed, and today it Is buying a great part of its supplies from the north.