32 REPORT OK OIM-MCK OI' EXi'ElUMENT STATIONS. 



niadc tests of a lar^o nuinbor of puiiii)s in use in southorn California; 

 Prof. J. X. Ja\ Conto, of the University of California, made mechan- 

 ical tests of pumps at that university ; Prof. W. B. Gregory made 

 similar tests at Tulane University in New Orleans, and Mr. A. J. 

 Bowie, of this Oflice, collected data re^ardin^ pinnjjs in use for irri- 

 gation in the Eastern States. We have in this way collected a vast 

 amount of mechanical data which will be of great use to manufac- 

 turers of pumps and to purchasers, since it wull show what types of 

 pumps are best suited to various kinds of pumping. 



Between the Rocky Mountains on the west and the line of an annual 

 rainfall of 20 inches on the east is a strip of land known as the semi- 

 arid region, which extends from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico and 

 Avhicli has a total area of over 1^00,000,000 acres. A large settlement 

 was made in this territory in 1884, 1885, and 188G. The cause was 

 a series of years of more than average rainfall. This led to a belief, 

 which was sedulously fostered by land boomers and real-estate agents, 

 that the building of railroads and the cultivation of the lands of the 

 East had brought about a change of climate and that the rain belt, 

 as it was called, was steadily extending westward and would ulti- 

 mately cause the rainfall of that country to be as abundant as it is in 

 Illinois or Iowa. A series of dry years folloAved. The result was 

 that in western Kansas and Nebraska and eastern Colorado and 

 Wyoming nearly all of the settlers were compelled to abandon their 

 homes, lands, and everything the}^ had done with them and begin 

 life over again after years of hardship and privation that have been 

 unsurpassed at any era in the settlement of this country. Not only 

 that, but many of these settlers, realizing that ultimate failure was 

 inevitable, mortgaged their homes to eastern investors Avithout any 

 intention of ever paying back the money borrowed. The consequence 

 was that hundreds of thousands of dollars of eastern money sent to 

 that country was lost. Within the last two years a similar movement 

 to people that region and to extend the settled territory far to the 

 west of that heretofore attempted has been undertaken, and in some 

 localities it has gone beyond the limits of safety if dependence is had 

 on rainfall alone. The foundation for this new feeling of confidence 

 is two or three years of more than average rainfall and the improve- 

 ments which have been made in the past twenty years in methods of 

 cultivating the soil and in the production of drought-resistant crops. 

 There is every reason to believe that these improvements will permit 

 of the extension of settlement and give a better chance for success 

 than Avas had twenty years ago, but all of these will not permit of 

 agriculture by rainfall alone in much of the country now being set- 

 tled and in much more that it is proposed to settle. 



In view of these facts it is believed that the creation of a perma- 

 nently prosperous body of settlers in that I'egion requires the de- 



