The Glasgow courier., 1921-02-04

* s. 81 * x y 4 81 s.
was, and continues to be, the keynote
of the situation. Nor is it climate of
that constitutional and well-ordered
nature largely prevalent in the states
east of the Mississippi rives. 1t is, in
fact, a negation of all those sentiments
which we of the Temperate Zone are
apt to entertain as to the benefcent
attitude of nature towards man.
They have different conception and
different attitude in the Tropics,
where bitter experience has taught
them of the sister and unrelenting hos
tiliy to man of animal and vegetable
life, and of the weather against whose
deadly influence he must forever be
taking precautions lest he perish, for
the climate of Kansas is by turns a
blessing and a calamity. There are
years when the clouds drop fatness,
and years when, in the words of Elijah,
"the sky is as brass and the earth as
iron underneath"
The topography of Kansas, devoid
of hills and mountains. and largely of
forests, offers little resistance to those
ceaseless winds following in the track
VI Doeil cIlC SouIilWcSCSlll anu IlOl III
western barometric CLOVIS" which move
in regular procession across the state.
But the land has abundant sunshine
for its portion, thus adding much to it's
agricultural possibilities.
The real problem is the uncertainty
of the rainfall. In the eastern portion
the average precipitation is about 40
inches, decreasing progressively west
ward, until at the Colorado line, ap-
proXimately distance of 400 miles,
it falls to 20 inches and less.
The summers of small precipitation
are always those of extremely high
temperature, 116 degrees having been
recorded, often accompanied by hot
winds which wither and destroy all liv-
vegetation as with the growth of a
furnace The wet years and the dry
years have a fashion, like most things
in nature. of flocking together, after
their kind. in two or three successive
seasons.
During the wet years the farmers of
Kansas raised great crops. But, when
the turn came and the rains almost
ceased, the farmers, especially in the
western section of the state went
broke. and tided over the hard times
llby being Carried" by the storekeepers
and local bankers.
For time, during the years of pre-
cipitation, there prevailed the current
delusions, current even now, that the
climate was changing, that rainfall
was increasing, that planting trees and
cultivating the soil produced greater
precipitation. Meanwhile, pitiless Ma
ture. who is no respector of men nor
their theories, had up her sleeve bit
ter disillusionment for these dwellers
in Fools Paradise, in the shape Of
an irregular, yet relentless, recurrence
of those years of drought and misfor-
tune which were the source of most
of the troubles of the people of the
state.
They saw the wheat yield dropped
from 74,000,000 bushels in 1892 to 49,
600. 900 bushels in 1895 and corn from
1873, 100000 bushels in 1892 to 66,000,-
600 bushels in 1894.
Finally, many farmers, especially in
western Kansas, gave up the unequal
contest and, abandoning their farms,
trekked eastward. So, in a number of
counties, population declined, and bust
ness suffered accordingly. Two bad
crop years eliminated in the disastrous
drought of 1894. Then followed the
campaign for Free Silver. when Kan
sas, for the time being, cast all her
former political idols to the dogs anG
went hell-bent for sixteen to one ratio.
That was the winter of her discomfort.
and the depth OF her despair. But the
sun of York was soon to rise, for it
was the turning point and beginning
pf ba onI Of trpi1h1n,1S for X ~
SaS.
1t was at this time that the fortune
of the state was at It's lowest ehJ.
Kansas was byword 30 unknoWing
for mortgaged forms, discontented and
possible theories of government and
| finance. "What'S the matter with
Kansas" was a current jibe of the
times. Those were the days in which
the farmers of Kansas were prone to
follow the advice of their wives and
'to raise more corn and less hell In
vestment and capital fought shy Of
the state because of its Free Silver
proclivities and the retaliatory laws
passed against outside investors and
the railroads within the state.
AS with most western states at that
time, Kansas suffered from the preda-
tory exploitation of some railroad fin
anciers to whom railroad management
was merely great game at the ex-
pense of the stockholders and the peo-
pie. So the bitterness grew on both
sides to an extent that took years, to
assuage and remove.
Yet at this critical and tumultuous
period, when misunderstanding and
misconception on both sides was at its
height, it needed but a modicum Of
common-sense and the study of eX-
perience to realize that the state Of
fered in the future one of the surest
and most profitable fields for business