24 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



freedom from all personal restraint are the qualities which, 

 above all others, are essential to the industrial growth of our 

 nation. 



As a farming community our state is second to none, and a 

 short drive along any of our country roads is sufficient to con- 

 vince any reasonable mind that our assertion is not without 

 foundation. 



Development along agricultural lines has probably been more 

 rapid during the past few years than at any time prior thereto, 

 and we are compelled to look upon the farmer in a true light 

 and realize that he is the mightiest factor in the development of 

 our state and the upbuilding of the nation. 



But before we proceed further it will not be inconsistent to 

 look for a few moments at the earlier history of this region. 



Its invasion by white men was unlike that of the lake region. 

 Our first explorers came from the south and long antedates the 

 arrival of explorers in what is commonly known as the north- 

 west. Although Nebraska forms the geographical center of 

 the United States, the phenomenon of settlement and civiliza- 

 tion has made it appear far to the west; and when one first 

 glances at the history of this region without first preparing 

 ones mind for the truth, it is reasonable to expect to trace the 

 march of civilization either from the early settlements in the 

 east, or from the early highways which furnished passage alike 

 to the devout missionary and the avaricious seeker after gold. 

 But modern research dispels the obscuring mists which for 

 centuries have hidden from view the fact that the southwestern 

 and middle portions of the United States were visited by white 

 men nearly a century before commercial relations were estab- 

 lished with the Indians of Wisconsin, and while yet the "great 

 water to the west" was known to those eastern tribes merely as 

 a matter of tradition. 



We are apt to look upon Nebraska as a young state. Young 

 in its geological formation, young in its political existence, and 

 young in its historical records. For descriptions of its soil, its 

 climate, its production or its inhabitants, few are compelled to 

 look farther back than the beginning of the present century, 

 and its pubhshed memorials prior to the advent of the French 



