The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1923-10-04


when Io&a was mortgased 20 com
y pletely that ono could travail acroo,
the state In certain bolts and never
be on of mortgaged lands excepting
when they crossed the roads. The
COW, the pig and the hen lifted the
mortgages long ago and built big
barns and silos and good houses
painted them all frequently and
covered the state with high schools,
churches, kindergarten schools and
luxuries. In the year 1917 the state
had six million hogs and in 1920 ten
million. Long ago it had enough
cows so If they were placed in pro-
cession end to end they would reach
to the moon and have some left to
| jump over it, some joker has said.
1t was said that Iowa received a
great influx of people in the late
fifties. developed rapidly thru the
sixties and seventies, then trebled
its population In ten years, quad
rupled 1t In the next ten, lacked
three-tenths of one per cent of hold
ing its own in the next, and in the
/ last decade gained little more than
/ 6 per cent. During the world war
Iowa went nutty on the price Of land.
sold thousands of farms at $500 and
$500 an acre on the installment plan,
took most Of them back again when
the buyers found they could not
make enough to pay the interest on
the deferred payments, and are now
| in the slough of dependency and
| their new senator, Brookhart de-
handing a special session of congress
to legislate them out of the hole.
Different ones at the meeting told
of how they had, as boys and girls,
gone barefoOted In summer and car
ried water to the harvest hands, how
they had snagged their little shins
on the stubbles, how they followed
the track of te drive wheel of the
reaper where the stubble was slanted
ahead, how they had grown larger
each year nursing an ambition to be
big enough to bind a station, follow
ing the self rake or to hold place
on the Marsh harvester that allowed
them to ride and bind standing on
platform that wobbled. Women In
the party told how father had re-
quired them as small girls, to husk
the down row" in husking time,
and the men reviewed the joys of
finding the red ears at the husking
bees. One speaker reviewed the COM
ing of the reapers, harvesters and
binders, and told of the invention of
the binder that used fine wire in
tying the bundles. The wires found
their way into the strawpile and
when swallowed by the cattle, killed
them OF in great numbers. Then
came the wholesale condemning of
the binders and the inventors met 1t
by changing to Irvine. When barbed
wire fence was introduced it MANNED
many animals, and it seemed as If
most of them ran into the wire on
slant and were sliced worse. One
speaker mentioned couple of Black
foot people, who just recently drove
thru Iowa on the Lincoln highway
and were impressed by the world of
crops, especially the corn! 1t seemed
as If there was too much of every
thing good, and any description of 1t
merely ran into superlatives and
lodged-language might describe 1t
sion Of the endless extent of 1t. Then,
too, the big barns and fine houses |
were there in endless procession
enough and to spare, and when some !
body at the picnic asked how many |
persons present would like to go
back to Iowa to live, two persons
raised their hands and another said |
she would like to go back if she could |
take the Idaho climate along. She
would be willing to take the vino
and dust too if she could only have !
the comforts and luxuries of Iowa
and yet cut out the hot, sultry nights |
of summer and the changeable cold |
and wet of winter. One speaker said |
that people here work harder than
they do in Iowa, and another cor
rected that by saying that we work
harder here at times, but that in
Iowa they keep everlastingly at it
and have everything they want
Somebody advised all lovers of
good story to read the book entitled
Vandermark's Folly" dealing with
the early settlement and develop
ment of Iowa. Vandermark came
into Iowa with oxen in 1855 and saw
it all and has recently described it all
in admirable detail and with remark
able charm and fascination. Pro-
lessor E. D. Bloom said his father
and mother came into the state the
same year as Vandemark and by the
very same roads and ferries, and
when he discovered the book he sent
them a copy. They lived life over
again while they read it and could
almost put their finger on Vande-
mark himself. The author has
since written a sequel to Vande-
marks Folly entitled "The Hawk
,ye'' and Hamlin Garland has writ
EN- very popular book entitled
The Sons of the Middle Border"
md another "The Daughters of the
Middle West"
The people at the picnic decided to
organize and have an annual picnic
ate in summer, and made A. r.
Woodward president and Byrd Trego
secretary. A committee to select
he time and place and arrange for
he 1924 picnic consists of Grant
Holt of Blackfoot, J. L. Moore Of
Shelley and L. X. Hogan of Idaho
Falls. Everybody from Iowa is to be
considered as belonging to the oc-
aston of the annual picnic, and this,