The Kevin review. [volume] (Kevin, Mont.) 1922-1929, 1922-12-07
By LESTER COLE
Editor The Montana Farmer

the great mlQulG WCOt-W 90 JONho tAS
farmers in southern Iowa n Illinois
shook their heads when they heard
that settlers in the northern districts
of those states were trying to raise
corn. cit can't be DONE they said.
"The northern and western limits OF
the corn belt have been reached and
corn can be pushed no further But
the old timers of the corn belt were
mistaken and the settlers to the north
and west succeeded in their efforts
to adapt corn to their lands and then,
as the agricultural frontier was push
ed farther and farther westward and
northward, corn followed in the path
way OF flax and wheat until Kansas,
Nebraska and the Dakotas had been
added to the dominions of King Corn,
that great builder of a permanent
and substantial agriculture.
Crossing the line into Montana was
but another step for this ambitious
monarch and for a number OF years
eastern and some parts OF central,
Montana have been producing sub
stantial crops of corn fodder. In 1910
there were 10000 acres of corn in
these sections of the state. BY 1913
the acreage virtually doubled and by
1915 there were 10000 acres in corn.
Since then, this almost phenomenal
increase has kept on until corn has
become a valuable and an important
crop. This season just jast has been
a remarkably successful corn year for
Montana and the states 240 900
acres of corn have produced bount-
eous crops of corr for "hogging off"
for fodder, for ensilage and for grain.
Northern Montana Invaded
When the average Montanan
thinks of Montana grown corn, he
thinks of the fields in the central,
southern and particularly eastern
sections of the state, and there, it is
true, the greater part of Montana's
corn crop is produced. But, r to
his old habits, the progressive mon
arch - King Corn - has been busy
conquering new territory. About the
first the average citizen of the state
knew of this latest invasion was when
he picked up his morning paper a few
weeks ago and read the first an
nouncement of the Northern Montana
Corn show to be held at Malta. No
doubt he glanced over h item cas-
ually, reflected for a moment on the
folly of such an undertaking II
passed on to more serious things.
Little did he realize that corn pro-
duction had reached a stage of con-
siderably more than minor import
ance in the tier of counties that
stretch along the Canadian line, that
in this northern territory. the acreage
given over to this crop is as great as
the entire corn acreage of the state
less than 10 years ago, that almost
half the farmers in the district from
Hill county to the Dakota border are
growing corn.
This change from straight wheat
farming is taking place quietly. The
dawn of the new era has come swift
ly and although northern Montana is
Just on the threshold of the newer
and better agriculture, the progress
that has already been made, as DEM
onstrated by the first annual Nor
thern Montana Corn show, held at
Malta, is remarkable and wonderfully
encouraging. The crying need OF
the vast dry land area along the nor
thern border has been for a feed
crop, dependable enough to form the
basis for a more diversified and a
more permanent and profitable sys-
TEN of farming. To the hundreds of
visitors who attended the exhibition
at Malta there can be no doubt that
the need is being answered.
Corn Gives Confidence
To the farmers, to the bankers, to
the business men of northern Mon
tana is coming a feeling of calm con-
fidence in the future and the foun-
lo+;1, af 4hot aapfidnna 10 CORN
Straight wheat farming is recognized
wherever it has been carried on as
a gamble-as a temporary system OF
farming at best and as a particularly
hazardous enterprise in many sec
lions of the northwest during the con-
ditions, economic and climatic, that
have prevailed for the last few years.
Corn farming is safe and permanent
farming because corn is the premier
feed crop of America, means live.
stock, supplementary crops, rotation
in short Investigation, and div
justification means safe farming, en-
ployment the year round and prosper
Gus homes. And so out of the years
of uncertainty, of failure and des-
pair in dry land districts toward the
Canadian border has been born a
new understanding of a sane agri-
culture.
Among the visitors at the corn x
hibit at the Phillips county court
house last week were men and women
who would not believe at first that
all of the 5000 fully matured ears
of corr on display had actually been
grown on the farms of northern Mon
tana and had not been imported Tor
the occasion from Iowa or Illinois.
Many we're amazed to learn that for
each ear on the racks there were
more than 10 acres in corn in the
northern border counties this year.
Included in the show we're hundreds
of exhibits representing the varieties
that are being grown and adapted
to northern Montana conditions-the
Northwestern dent, White flint, yell
low flint, White dent, Yellow dent,
and the mixed flints.
One of the interesting features of
the show was an exhibit OF Two ears
- uo1Iou, FLINT oorp-Opn grown in |