.V24 



HORTICULTURE. 



Auiil 21, 1906 



landscapes that have been growing and 

 ■will continue to grow for centuries, 

 that are certain of destruction sooner 

 or later if in private hands, for there 

 is no entailment of estates in this 

 country that will keep them for centu- 

 ries in a family. The only assurance 

 for the preservation of such objects 

 lies in their being placed permanently 

 in the hands of some legally consti- 

 tuted body of officials or citizens' 

 associations with the power to hold 

 and administer the land and keep it 

 open to the public for all time, with 

 moneys secured from taxation, from 

 gift, or from the property itself. There 

 are dangers to be guarded against, 

 however. 



Until the time comes when such 

 intrinsically valuable natural resources 

 upon a public reservation as minerals, 

 forests and waters, will be managed 

 "honestly for the benefit of the public, 

 with a proper regard for aesthetic, as 

 well as economic returns, such re- 

 courses will be a serious menace to 

 the public interests, and will compel 

 a constant fight to prevent private 

 parties from destroying that which is 

 of the greatest value to the public. For 

 example, it would appear that in spite 

 of all the protest that has been made 

 against such desecration, Niagara 

 Falls is doomed. On one side, the 

 power rights upon a reservation 

 acquired for the people, have been sold 

 for a mess of pottage. We have heard 

 how public-spirited the Power Com- 

 panies are in providing a very large 

 fund for the maintenance of the public 

 park, but when the Power Companies 

 have taken all the water from Niagara 

 Falls how impossible it will be with 

 all the money that can be secured 

 from the power generated by this 

 water to construct artificially a natural 

 object as fine or as impressive as the 

 Falls now are. 



Another danger comes from the op- 

 portunities that are offered for political 

 patronage in our parks or park systems 

 that have been and are expensive to 

 acquire, to construct and to maintain. 

 Where there is much patronage this 

 control is pretty sure to pass from the 

 group of public-spirited and self-sac- 

 rificing men who initiated the park 

 movement and established the parks, 

 to the politician. Not only is this 

 true of the city, but it often is true of 

 the small towns where similar political 

 conditions prevail in a small way. 



Again the great taxable value of 

 such large reservations in the heart 

 of a city, as Boston Common, New 

 York Central Park, have led to re- 

 peated efforts to secure some portions 

 of the park for commercial use for 

 public institutes or public buildings. 

 The Subway is already in the edge of 

 both Boston's Common and its Public 

 Gardens and a group of museums is 

 spreading over a considerable portion 

 of Central Park, and propositions to 

 run streets through these reservations 

 crops out periodically. It should be 

 bcrne in mind, however, that neither 

 of these reservations were originally 

 designed to be a part of a modern 

 park system. 



It is such considerations that lead 

 me to believe that it is not always 

 ■wise to include in our city park system 

 very large bodies of land having a 

 high taxable value, especially where 

 they form a barrier to direct lines of 

 travel, as does Central Park of New 

 York. Furthermore, the fact that the 



electric car lines and the automobile 

 make the range of a daily outing so 

 much greater than was possble a few 

 years ago with the horse, that our 

 public pleasure road system must be 

 much more extensive than they are 

 now to serve the needs of that part of 

 the public who pay the largest share 

 of the taxes, while the requirements of 

 the people in moderate circumstances 

 who most need the parks, should be 

 supplied by the isolated small local 

 playgrounds, or playgrounds upon 

 broadenings in adjacent park-ways to 

 which these people may walk daily. 

 They cannot go daily to the large 

 parks, for they are at such a distance 

 that they must pay car fares to reach 

 them. Undoubtedly the present nu- 

 clei of town, city, county, state and 

 national park? will expand into a 

 national system, in which the steam 

 roads, already great national park- 

 ways, and the electric, automobile and 

 carriage roads will have their logical 

 place. It will be a system based first 

 upon practical consideration, the reser- 

 vations being governed by the topog- 

 raphy, and so located as to include the 

 natural lines of travel, as the rail- 

 roads are now located along stream 

 valleys, which are also the natural 

 lines of drainage. 



You are asking by this time what 

 this has to do with my Outdoor Art 

 proposition, which you may from its 

 designation regard as an aesthetic con- 

 sideration only. If you do, I want to 

 protest against your disposition to set 

 a barrier between beauty and utility, 

 for the more you think and observe 

 the more you will be convinced that 

 they go hand in hand and that intrin- 

 sic values are depending more and 

 more upon beauty, a gospel that 

 should be preached and preached. 



Bear in mind that our modern park 

 systems are very generally extended to 

 include the valleys and shores of 

 streams, the shores of ponds, the high 

 bluffs along stream valleys, and the 

 summits of hills, land of the smallest 

 commercial value on account of oc- 

 casional submergence or its inaccessi- 

 bility, the land that the owners are 

 most likely to give for a public res- 

 ervation because of its low value, the 

 land that has been neglected and 

 thereby allowed to acquire a beautiful 

 growth of trees and shrubs. 



I would again place emphasis upon 

 the fact that those who would endur- 

 ingly improve their town must do 

 more than to encourage the planting 

 of flower beds and cleaning of yards. 

 These are important details and they 

 all help to educate public sentiment 

 in the right way. This, however, is 

 not the kind of work that is likely to 

 enlist the earnest support of the most 

 far-seeing business and professional 

 men, — the men who prefer to do big 

 tilings. Such men when they once 

 realize the importance and value of a 

 comprehensive plan of the town that 

 will include in a public reservation 

 system the land of little value, but of 

 great beauty, will put in work that 

 will count. 



This Association, and the majority 

 of its departments are enlisted in edu- 

 cating the people up to the point 

 where they will do just such work as 

 I have outlined. I conceive it to be 

 the special work of the Outdoor Art 

 Department to help the people to gain 

 a fuller appreciation of the real beauty 

 of the common scenes and objects 

 about them that can be acquired and 



developed at small cost to show them 

 how they can again at small cost 

 make many hideous objects and scenes 

 attractive. I would place special em- 

 phasis upon the small cost, because I 

 believe if we are to have a more beau- 

 tiful America, we must enlist the mul- 

 titude who have small means, as well 

 as the comparatively few with large 

 resources. 



CALIFORNIA NOTES. 



The last session of the legislature 

 $1 ."in. mm «as appropriated to buy an 

 experimental farm for the University 

 of California. During the last sev- 

 eral months the committee of soil ex- 

 l it'll s on selection have carefully ex- 

 amined the twenty -seven farms offered 

 tn i lie state for this purpose and this 

 week the selection was made of Yolo 

 county farm near the town of Davis- 

 ville. 



There are brisk doings also in the 

 Fresno laisii^ field. The prices are 

 edging up, and some packers are offer- 

 ing 3 1-2 cents a pound, although the 

 standard quotations are 3 1-4 cents. 

 At a meeting of raisin growers in 

 Dinuba district last week a pool of 

 one thousand tons of fruit was sold 

 under three-years' contract at 3 1-4 

 cents to packers. This is the first 

 contract for a large amount made by 

 packers for ahead business for some 

 time and indicates the activity that 

 characterizes the market and the 

 prospects for still higher figures. 



At the fortnightly meeting on the 

 7th instant of the Pacific Coast Horti- 

 cultural Society, the president, J. W. 

 Bagge, read an original paper of en- 

 tertaining merit, his subject being the 

 gladiolus. A measure was introduced 

 at this meeting and given its first of 

 three necessary readings before action, 

 the purport being to have only one 

 meeting of the association a month. 

 The arguments advanced by the pro- 

 ponents of the measure was that the 

 members are in the habit of turning 

 out well at the first meeting in the 

 month and not nearly as well at the 

 second. 



In the San Joaquin Valley the rav- 

 ages of the blight are expected to 

 reduce the yield one-third. About 

 Armona many orchards have been 

 partially put out of business as far 

 as this season is concerned. In the 

 Yisalia district the damage is consid- 

 erable, and the packing and canning 

 interests are seriously alarmed for 

 supplies in that quarter. The Reed- 

 ley district in this county is said to 

 lie afflicted to a large extent, and the 

 blight has made its appearance in 

 Oleander and Easton districts. 



Several horticulturists are in the 

 city this week from Fresno, the great 

 dried-fruit district of California. The 

 news they bring is that "dried fruit 

 is soaring;" that the price of peaches 

 has gone to 8 cents a pound, which 

 is said to be the record up to this 

 time in the State, a price that assures 

 the grower of a return of from $350 

 to $4i"i an acre from his land. There 

 were some sales last year at S cents, 

 but the prevailing rate was 7 cents. 

 Only packers who sold short and 

 were caught without stock to make 

 good their speculation were buyers 

 at the higher figure. This time 8 

 cents is the standard, and growers are 

 not hurrying over each other at that 

 to dispose of their crop. There is a 

 big growing demand, a prospect of a 



