The Wolf Point herald. (Wolf Point, Mont.) 1913-1940, 1920-08-05
YEAR OF STATES
GREATEST GROWTH
HEAVIEST IMMIGRATION OF SET.
TIERS TO STATE TOOK PLACE
IN THE YEAR 1910
One Short Month Saw LOO Home
ecker Cross the Mississippi From
the Eastern and Central States,
bringing Their Families to the
Last Public Land State.

- JNSio 0SO q lncIS lICIn III
middle west, and even from the ia
eastern states, were turning Montana
ward in great numbers. The call t,
the state of mountains and prairies
where there were still millions O
acres OF land to which the title still
vested in Uncle Sam, land that coulC
be had for the asking, proved thu
magnet which was drawing the at
tention of the farmers of the state.
of the east and which made the yea
1910 probably the greatest in the set
tlement of the farm lands of thi.
state.
Thousands of immigrants came
into Montana that year and the story
of their coming was being told in
all the weekly and daily publications
of the state, which then were few in
comparison with the present when
every little hamlet has it's weekly
paper.
sit sounds like fiction, this won
derful story of moving immigrant
colonies from the east, who take I'D
their pilgrimage to a new country
with faces aglow with the hope that
for them life may begin anew in the
Great Treasure state.
I'm n short month, HOP car
loads of immigrant moyeables, repre-
senting approximately as many fami-
lies and fully 5000 persons, have
crossed the Mississippi from the
plains of the north central states,
some coming from as far east as
New York and Pennsylvania" Thus
was told the opening paragraphs of
a story of the opening of the immi-
grafton into Montana in the spring
of 1910, one of the heaviest, if not
the very heaviest year of immigra-
ton to the state.
"This coterie of co1onists," con-
tinues the story, "the forerunners of
that tide of h~omeseekers that is
bound to cross the border of the great
commonwealth of Montana in 1910,
represents that class of hardworking,
honest, steady, American manhood
of which any state or country may
well feel proud. Someone has we'll
said The history of a state is the
biography Of it's men,
''These are not the offcast. or scum
OF some foreign country, not the wan
nomads of the more modern
times, but the best, from a good land.
They are the kind who, beaten back
one year, rise in their strength the
next and turn apparent defeat into
a well earned victory. They come
in whole families, the men bring
wives and children, their live
stock and their implements with
them.
~. F. McGaughey, assistant gen
eral passenger and freight agent for
Great Northern railway at Hell
ana, tells the story of how in four
weeks, or from the latter part of
March up to this time april 28)
|, 102 carloads of immigrant effects
lave been brought from eastern and
states towns to the great,
vide plains of Montana, where they
established themselves on half
in the dry farming district,
I'll intent on making a home for
themselves and their children, in the
empire of the northwest.
"Mr. McGaughey said These men
nd ome are not the lazy, shiftless
armer Or mechanic, who have been
Unable to make good elsewhere.
hey are the successful, small farmer
nd the representatives of the great, |
turdy middle class, who are a credit
o any state.
MANY of these men are college or
gricultural school graduates. Their !
hildren have been we'll reared and |
iven an education. Seventy-five per !
ent of the children of these men and
who will make up a very con-
part of the next generation |
Montanans, have received a high \
chool education, while many others
ave studied in higher institutions of
All this will show that
ne colonists coming to this state
ay after day, come from good
Jock.
zone colony of 81 came from
huntington, Indiana, where the good
ews was spread of what awaited the
in Montana. Another large :
olony that settled to the north was :
scruited in Champaign, ILL.,, a town I
f some size. Still another is from
Mo. Sixty-two cars of
immigrant ~moveables, representing
bout three-score families, settled
Judith Gap and Billings.
his colony has a steam plow outfit
III lOl ITO lCp1 CoChtdIiOn QiSW nuOoI- -
from the vicinity of Champaign.
mother colony comes here from
ew York. Most of the immigrants
re from farms of those states be-
yeen the Mississippi and the Appala-
han mountains.
when one man, who had seen
lis veritable promised land, and
new whereof he spoke, told of the
bod things in store for settlers here,
hole towns were deserted in some
and a train of immigrant
oveables started on its way west
ard
"These people burned their bridges
,hind them. No returning for them.
nee they had decided to go, they
ent, ~discounting all the chances.
hey are not the kind that turn back.
OF a few sold small farms, ranging
lywhere from 25 to so acres, at
,rhaps SIS to $50 an acre, and with
e few thousand dollars, are well
lie to begin work on their 800 acres
re.
''Steam plows are In demand, and
Of acres of sod are being =