The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1919-06-19
I never did like a breaking plow,

LIZ O1CCA d 6A4SA
calls his ranch near Hays, Kansas
Here is a ranch that is at once a con.
tradiction and a protest, an oasis OF
grass and cattle in dessert of wheat
When you get out around Hay;
you expect to see thousands of acres
of wheat, and you are not disappoint
ed. There is wheat in every direct
ion, and mighty good wheat it is, too
1t has a gluten content so high that
it is in demand thousands of miles
away for mixing with other wheat fol
milling purposes. When one is ex-
pecting to see purely wheat country
it is refreshingly unique to find this
contradiction in the form Of a splen-
did cattle ranch. And it is equally
refreshing to find this protest against
what most people conceive to be the
general scheme of agriculture for
that wide scope of country. Most
men fall in with the procession when
it comes to fashions in agriculture,
just as they do when it comes to fash
ions in neckties or hats. But not so
with Alex Philip. He has keep
steadily enough in line as to wearing
apparel; but, when other men began
to set the fashion of sticking plows
into the prairie and driving across it
with drills, he proved to be a staunch
conservative, an uncompromissing
standpatter. Let other men raise
wheat if they would; he had always
raised cattle, and to cattle his land
shonld be devoted to the end of the
chapter. He never liked a breaking
pillow anyhow.
So it comes about that the visitor
who drives out from Hays runs onto
this agricultural survival, ranch of
AGO acres, over which the cattle
roam just as they did in the days of
the range. Most of it has never felt
the edge of pillow. While wheat has
brought wealth to many another citi-
zen of that part of Kansas, and while
the people out there are mighty proud
of their record as producers of that
cereal, Alex Philip also has prospered.
You won't ''talk farm" long in Hays
until someone tells you of Alex Philip
and his ranch. They are just as
proud of him and his cattle as they
are of their wheat, which is saying a
good deal.
Alex Philip has done lot to help
make Western Kansas prosper. He
is proud of the community in which
he lives, and he is never happier than
when he is showing some visitor the
Normal School or the State Expert
ment Station or telling him of the
glories of Kansas in general and
Hays in particular. On the other
hand, Western Kansas has done lot
for Alex Philip. Speaking of that
takes US from Kansas back to Lon
don, England long jump, to be
sure, but one that must be taken if
this story must be told in it's fullness.
Some 40 years or more ago Alex
Philip was a clerk in the Bank of Eng
land at London. A prosperous ca
reer seemed opening before him.
He might have been one of the fin
ancia1ly big men of England today,
as some of his associates have be-
come, had he stayed on. But as the
old romances say, fate willed other
wise. With all the SYMPTOMS of tuber-
culosis showing, it was either leave
London or leave this good old world.
Kansas and Cattle Did the Work
So Alex Philip went over across to
Kansas, full of hopes and not few
fears. He hadn't been there long,
though, until his health began to i'm
prove. The bracing air of the par
les soon made him as sound as a dollar
and now, with something akin to old
age approaching, their isn't health
Ter, heartier man of his years in the
country. He has been back to visit
the scenes of his boyhood a number
of times, for he has natural affec-
ton for the place where his youth
was spent. But Kansas has given him
health, happiness and prosperity, and
that's about all any country can do
for any man.
Soon after landing in Kansas he
got into the cattle business. He has
seen Western Kansas pass from an
open range to what it is today. Ii
was riding the ranch and the trail,
hearding his cattle in the open, often
with only the sky for a blanket, that
gave him a deep love for cattle and
the open paririe. Anyone who has
ever visited one of these few remain
ing great open places, surrounded as
many of them are by plowed fields
will readily understand the pangs OF
the oldtime cowman at the passing OF
the range. It is easy to see why
Alex Philip never liked breaking
plow anyhow.
All these years cattle have beer
grazing on this ranch while wheat
was being grown on neighborine
farms. There are more than soc
head now, all of them highclass Here
fords. Still, some feed must be
raised if possible, and some 800 acre.
have been devoted to the production
of corn, kafr, sudan grass and mil