The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1935-04-19
BY WILLIAM C. uTLEY


wind will blow it away, and
you with it."
That's what the cattlemen of south
eastern Colorado told the homestead
ers SO years ago. The homesteaders
plowed the buffalo grass. Today the
wind has blown away the land and
many have been forced to move.
Had the farmers of the Great Plains
Of Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Tex
as, Arkansas and Nebraska cultivated
their lands with little more foresight
in the years gone by, they would not
today, perhaps, have been forced to
watch the great red and yellow plague
of soil erosion blow their farms from
the face of the earth-or more literally,
blow the face of the earth from their
farms, which is the same thing.
During the World war wheat prices
scared sky high. Short-grass prairies
were the only virgin soil which re-
manned for wheat production, and to
these plains rushed thousands of farm
ers with their plows. The harvest was
rich, indeed, with several seasons of
good rainfall Then came years of
drouth. With them was the return to
something like normal-and less-in
wheat prices. What land was not
abandoned was farmed only in hap
hazard manner.
Wheat acreage was further de-
creased Is per cent by the administra-
TONS wheat allotment program. Pro-
duction ceased on much of this land;
the remainder got very little attention.
Probably this was the land where the
recent dust storms first began to get
"body." With this power of aggrava-
ton it was an easy matter for the dust
laden winds to collect more and more
of their devastating burden from the
land in western Kansas which is han
died by nonresident farmers who "hog-
in" their crop by the "cut-and-cover"
method Of farming which covers large
territories quickly, but so poorly that
the topsoil blows easily, and when it
starts to blow, no one is there to
stop 1t.
Dust Travels ar.
From this start the storms which,
during March, ragged at terrific heights
for from four to twelve days, spread
through neighboring states. Huge
cloud-palls Of white, yellow and red
black dust reached as far as Denver,
st. Louis, Cleveland and even Wash
ington in a weird reversal of the
"back-to-the-soil" movement that struck
the more unfortunate element of met
ropolitan population little while back.
In the stricken Great Plains area
highway traffic was stopped to pre-
vent accident. Schools and business
houses shut their doors. Health Off
GERS warned everyone to stay at home
if possible. Railway traffic was stilled.
Several children and adults died Of
"dust pneumonia" Live stock refused
to eat grass and hay even when they
could find it under the drifts of eroded
soil that were so high irNmany places
that one could walk up drift to the
roof of a tall barn. Even in the cities
it was necessary to sleep and often
work with wet cloths tied over nose
and mouth.
In Chicago and central Illinois the
dust united with showers of rain and
the weather man said to the inhabi-
tants, Here's mud in your eye" They
soon found out he meant it only too
literally.
The great storm of May II, 1884,
which stretched from Montana to the
Atlantic and hung 10O00-ton cover
of dust over the National Capital was
something of a calamity. The storm of
March, 1885, was major catastrophe.
Fertile areas, once garden spots. be-
came, as the dust clouds gained momen-
tum, Ike barren deserts. Good farm
ers as well as bad were driven from
their land and their homes, knowing
not whittier to turn. Now the govern
ment is beginning to wake to full
realization of the seriousness of the
problem Of erosion.
Fifty million acres of crop-producing
land have been destroyed in the United
States by wind and water soil-erosion.
Another 125, 100000 acres have lost the
topsoil, and 1O0,OO0O00 additional acres
are approaching this condition, accord
ing to the Department of Agriculture.
A total of rs per cent of all the farm
land used for clean-tilled crops is SUBJ
ject to erosion and damage, which the
department estimates at $40,00O,00O a
year.
Causes Heavy Loss.
The 3.OO0,OOO,0OO tons of son lost ev-
cry year through erosion would fill
train of freight cars that would en-
circle the world 81 times at the equa-
tor, says r. e. INLAND, of the United
States soil erosion service. He point
ed out that figures of loss do not take
} into account the damage done to high
ways, railways, reservoirs, streams,
bitches and harbors. He said that
northern Missouri's so per cent loss
of fertile top surface soil, represents
more than so per cent fertility wastage
because In the top four or five inches
Of the original soil was concentrated