96 MISSOURI AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 



A man with moderate means can locate in Missouri, buy a good farn', 

 enjoy all the advantages of modern social community, on payment of less 

 taxes than he can anywhere else in the United States. Figures and statis- 

 tics will prove each of these assertions. 



The soil and climate makes this locality the natural home of all nu- 

 tritious grasses. Blue grass, which has made certain sections of Ken- 

 tucky famous, has been found to be particularly adapted to the soil of 

 Missouri. It grows s^wntaneously wherever it is left free from the plow. 

 But Missouri does not depend alone on its blue grass. It grows other 

 varieties equally nutritious and as valuable for pasturage, also possess- 

 ing the advantage of being cut and dried for hay. Orchard grass, tim- 

 othy, red top, alfalfa and clovers thrive in the soil. Missouri hills are as 

 rugged as the Highlands of Scotland and her valleys as fertile as those of 

 the Nile, where can be grown in abundance everything needful to man- 

 kind. 



Dairying in Missouri has been successful!}^ tested. Milk, butter and 

 cheese are produced at a minimum cost, and while the country possesses 

 more natural advantages for dairying than New York, it is equally well 

 situated in close proximity to large markets for these products as the 

 Empire State. St. Louis on the east, Kansas City and St. Joe on the 

 w^est, with scores of smaller but well populated cities in the interior, 

 all connected by intersecting lines of our great railway systems. 



The same conditions which prevail for the successful raising of cat- 

 tle and dairying, apply to the wool growing industry. There are no de- 

 vastating blizzards, no enervating spells of excessive heat and drought, 

 no epidemics, to decimate the flocks. 



The coal deposits of Missouri have been estimated to be sufficient to 

 supply the demand of adjoining communities for centuries. A territory 

 comprising twenty thousand square miles of the State's surface covers 

 these deposits. Extending from Clark county in a southwesterly direc- 

 tion down through the State to the Indian territory, there are extensive 

 coal fields in nearly every county northwest of such line. 



Coal mines have been worked with apparently but little effort, with- 

 out the use of expensive machinery, deep shafts being found to be neces- 

 sary. The coal is bituminous in character and of good quality. In more 

 than a thousand places along the lines of railroad, these coal deposits have 

 been tapped and furnish the greater part of the fuel used for commercial 

 and domestic purposes. 



The iron deposit of Missouri are too famous for lengthy comment. 

 Ore has been found in some sections in such vast quantities that it has 

 been roundly estimated it would supply one hundred furnaces for one 

 thousand years. 



