Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1944-10-06
Dept. of Interior
Plans Jobs for
III Million Vets

More than 100000 of our fighting
men, as they head home from Ber-
lin and Toxic, can find at least a
years employment on postwar prof.
ects already tentatively outlined for
congressional approval by the de-
partment of the interior. In addi-
ton, if congress approves, the pro-
gram would offer settlement and
other opportunities affecting the
lives of millions of Americans in
every part of the country.
Interiors proposed projects in
clude the opening up of vast new
irrigated farming empire, hydroeiec-
trio power development, flood con-
troll, forest protection, new mining
techniques, fish and wildlife con-
servation and many other economi-
cally desirable developments.
New and fertile farmland aggre-
eating as much territory as the
state of Maryland would be brought
into cultivation as one of the many
projects of the bureau of reclama-
ton. If congress approves, the
bureau will be ready to proceed with
236 projects in II western states.
A major portion of the building
would cover four-year period.
Actual construction would provide
553, 900 man-years of employment,
and the manufacture of contribu-
tory materials would require
another $4,000 man-years of labor.
Construction costs are estimated
at $2,952 ,613, 900, all of which-ex-
cept that portion dealing with flood
control and navigation-would be
reimbursable under the reclama-
ton laws.
Most of the program has to do
with irrigation projects which would
provide water for 6,707, 500 acres of
never-used but potentially fertile
soil, and supplemental water to
1855 ,295 acres on which farming is
a precarious gamble due to made
quate and uncertain rainfall.
Settlement on the newly-irrigated
land alone is possible for at least
$4,000 farm families, in addition to
$4,000 on the semi-arid land to be
furnished with supplemented water.
For every additional farm family
settled on the fully irrigated land
another family can find a good live
ihood in new or enlarged villages
and cities resulting from the de-
velopment.
The program should go long way
toward solving the postwar eco
nomic problem of the throngs of
war workers who have migrated to
the West to build ships and air
planes and other war weapons.
Hydroelectric power at Grand
Coulee, Bonneville and other sites.
has been the lodestone attracting
these hordes of war workers. And
cheap hydroelectric power will play
a large part in keeping them there.
The West, having tasted industrial
blood during the war years, is not
likely to be satisfied with less sub
stantial fare when peace comes.
Grazing Service.
Improvement of 142 100000 acres
of federal range lands in 10 western
states to provide a more stable and
dependable source of livestock prod
ucts is contemplated in the postwar
plans of the grazing service.
1t will be ready with plans for the
construction of thousands of small
range improvement projects,
grouped into IA major types such as
water development, fencing, revege-
tation, erosion control. stock trails,
bridges, truck trails, fire protection
and the control of rodents and other
predatory animals.
Heretofore the lack of such facili-
ties has resulted every year in losses