The Belding banner-news. (Belding, Mich.) 1918-1973, 1918-11-13
Tells OF fine
TRIP TO HOME in
GOLDEN WEST

MISS CLARA MOULTON. NOW A
RESIDENT OF PASADENA. CAL.
WRITES TO LOCAL FRIEND.
CONTINUED from last week.
All along the way would be little
booths set up beside the road where
one could buy fruit and sometimes
vegetables. We made two short stops
| of about 20 minutes each; had our
dinner beside the road, which took
about one hour; had tire trouble
which must have delayed US over an
hour and we reached Santa Barbara
at little after 5 o'clock having driv-
en- over there mountain roads, 112
miles. Part of the way we travel
what is called the FL Canine Real. or
the Kings Highway, it has every lit
tie ways q bell en- q post and is sup
posed to be the trail the Franciscan
fathers took in going from one mis-
sion to the other; there are 81 mis-
sions and they were supposed to be
a days journey apart, at one place
we branched off from this road and
took new paved way which has been
built within the last five years. 1t
lies at the foot of the mountains. or
rather part of it has been cut out of
and through the mountains; it is very
winding and one goes up and up for
long ways, mountains on either side,
or else a ravine; the mountains were
at the left Of US all day; we pass
through many small places. AS we
come down this pass which is called
Cone 10 Pass we can see Ventura lay
- - L ell I<.I< -
glorious sight to see the bright green
coloring, the green spots covered
would look like mountains but were
only hills. At the bottom of this
pass is what is supposed to be the
richest field in the world; they grow
lima beans around here and in this
particular field which contains prob
ably not less than $50 or 200 acres,
am no judge perhaps it is more
than that, for the last two years they
have taken 1-2 tons of beans to the
acre; last year the government paid
IL 1-2c per pound for the lima beans;
this field is owned by a Mexican and
could not be bought at any price. At
one place we go through is very
large Catholic church which this same
Mexican built. l suppose I saw
beans enough to cover all Of Ionia and
Montcalm counties and then some I;
they are the one crop which they say
does not hurt the land to grow year
after year, that in fact the land i'm
proves all the time. We saw large
walnut, peach, olive, lemon orchards.
The man who drove the car has a
brother who last year bought ten
acres Of walnut ranch on this read for
which he gave $11 1000. They own a
ranch off of the road and coming back
we made detour there and stayed
about two hours. They expect to
begin to harvest them the latter part
of this week; it is going to very hard
to get help this year, but out this way
the girls, some college girls. have en-
listed as farmerettes and are helping
harvest the crops; they helped with
the apricot crop and will probably
come to the front on the walnut crop.
III thought / might go out but have
made up my mind ] am a little too
fat vet to do 1T, she said they tried
all methods but at last padded their
\ overall knees heavy and just crawled
II along on the grounds as there is not
a spear of grass in sight | imagine
RA( fER%AA1 NC a VI ~ 10 AQclN Nv utkMl
II They have first class trees and last
year got % or 24e a pound for them
II They belong to q Walnut Growers
y association; before last year they had
always had to take their cuAs home
but last year the association toolzsthem
and made considerable out of them
they would shuck them and take out
the good ones, probably those are the
ones we buy when we buy shuckeC
ones, and out Of the ehuclxs they are
making something TO pack ammuni
tons in. People used to buy these
culls by the wagon load and they
would pick out the good ones and burr
the rest so you see the war has addeC
another use for them. At one time
last fall, or one NIGHT this association
which has large building at Saticoy
had over a million dollars worth Of
Walnuts stored there. We rode along
and at last / got my first sight Of TIKI
ocean; we rode for a number OF mile.
along the ocean at one place there wa.
. not room enough for the train. al
rather the railroad tracks and ths
wagon road so they built q bridge on
over the ocean, or rather along ant
over the beach, imagine it gets lit
tie damp at times. We could see tn,
keip beds cut IN the ocean and fhs
J dredge, or machine cutting it; at on,
place there were Mexicans drying it
they had cement slabs about or
} feet wide by 10 or - feet long; they
} would burn it and reduce it to ashes
believe that now they make potash
out Of these ashes. Iodine is alss
. made from kelp, while formerly abou
! all they knew how to use it for was I,
49,. IL. 4. - - 4
: Summerland whore there are oil wells
right out in the ocean it was a hor
J rid smelling place and / would not Xix,
to live there but suppose If | wer,
John Rockefeller / would not mins
| the smell as long as the millions wer,
pouring in. We came back onto tn,
. FL Canine Real again somewhere OF
, the way. The roads here are no
, much like the ones at home; we wer,
not as dirty and dusty on this lon,
ride as we would be going out {,