Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1933-02-16
4 BRIGHT POSSIBILITY FOR
ELECTRICITY USERS

ELE(IRlClI1 OSEhS
President-e ect Franklin ID.
Roosevelt has inspired progress
sives all over America by his
statement on the Muscle Shoals
project, the vast power PROPOSE
tion which has the making of
new Ruhr district, an industrial
territory planned on large scale
which will probably be the com
mencement of a great era in the
development of the power posi-
bilities in America, such as the
st. Lawrence Waterway, the Co.
lumbia River project. Boulder
Dam, the nine-foot channel with
all the possibilities in the Mis-
sissippi river. All this would
point to the possibility of max
ing available electricity at prices
which will be so reasonable as to
make possible the identification
of the agricultural regions of the
continent and contribute great
deal toward the elimination of
unemployment which is now so
rampant all over America.
The article in the February IS
issue of the Literary Digest en-
titled, Mr.. ROosevelt's Vision of
Tennessee Utopia" should be
widely read and follows:
There was no hesitation, no spar
ring with the correspondents, as the
President-elect. sitting by the fireside
in his Little White House" at Warm
Springs, went into an enthusiastic
description of his plan for launching
his first great drive against depreS-
sion. in the historic valley of the ro-
mantle Tennessee River.
This will be the widest experiment,
ever attempted by Government
concluded the President with {
smile, and as a Cleveland News writer
recalls, 1.-The newspaper men, as they
put their pencils away after almost
an hour of nOte-taking, agreed with
him
The cOuntry's response was crafty
ing to the President-elect, so the dis
patches tell US. Yet we find that the
response voiced by editorial comment
ranges all the way from the unre
strained enthusiasm of Tennessee
newspapers to the cold conclusion o.
some distant editors that it is all {
pork-barrel pipe-dream.
Piecing together reports of the
Roosevelt talk from various dispatche:
we find Mr.. Roosevelt pointing Ou
that the Government has long planned
and considered, even embarked upon
various schemes of reforeStatiOn
flood-cOntrOl, reclamation, wat e T.
Utilization, decentralization of indus
try. We have been going at such pro
jects piecemeal lever since the day:
of T.. r." says the President-elect, wht
believes, lit is now time to tie up al
these various developments into one
great comprehensive plan within I
given area" Now is the time, be
cause we have 100000 people ou
of work, with possibility of 5000,
900 remaining out of work even whel
business gets back to the 1929 level
Our population is out of balance,
says Mr.. Roosevelt; ''if by government
activity We can restore the balance
we will have taken great step for
ward"
He thinks perhaps $4,000 men coult
be kept at work in the Tennessee val
ley forests, and perhaps as many a
100000 could be employed on variou
developments of the project.
Roosevelt Gives Reasons.
And why the Tennessee? Well. Nj
Roosevelt points out that here is
great river basin covering $4,000
square miles, including parts of Ten
nessee, North Carolina, Virginia, Ala
bama, Mississippi, Georgia, and Ken
lucky. And here is great rive
whose flood waters pour into the Obi
and then into the Mississippi to ad
to the flood-time problems of Illinois
Missouri, Ohio, Arkansas, Mississippi
and Louisiana. Among other reason
for the Roosevelt choice, the Me-
York Herald Tribune notes thes
three:
Il. There probably are more el
listing data in the way of land an
flood surveys and economic survey
for the Tennessee basin than for an
other watershed.
~. The Government has large
existing financial interest theI
- h4 n
Shoals power and nitrate plants.