EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART VII 393 



One of the first observers of our association in the years gone by. 

 when those who were not members of it watclied our development with 

 kindly eye and helped us from time to time as they had opportunity, has 

 not been with us for some time past. I think he got some real benefit 

 from his associations with us in earlier years; I know I heard compli- 

 mentary remarks on his editorials during that period. I think we were 

 of real service to him, while he added to our .own pleasure very much. 

 And so I asked Mr. Harvey Ingham, of the Register and Tribune, to come 

 tonight and to once more get next to the real people of the state, renew 

 his allegiance, and get such inspiration as I think we can give him. We 

 will hear from him at this time. 



Mr. Ingham: Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: I can assure 

 you that it is with very great pleasure that I came back, after some 

 years, to this meeting of the stock growers of the state. You know there 

 are a great many of these organizations that start out with great 

 enthusiasm but do not last, and it is highly interesting to see an organ- 

 ization of this kind that becomes a permanent factor in the situation and 

 grows as the years go on. I want to particulaily congratulate this asso- 

 ciation on this account, because its business is one that goes to the very 

 heart of the proposition before the world today. 



You have been coming to Des Moines off and on for fourteen years. 

 Every time you come, you notice an improvement in the city — that more 

 is being done in a public way. What is the secret of that development? 



Des Moines was made up originally of thirteen separate towns, with 

 a river dividing them — "Uncle Dick" Clarkson used to call it "the river 

 of dividing strife." A few years ago, a body of young men undertook 

 to get the people of this city to work together, and since that effort began, 

 the city has spent over two million dollars on the river front. Five 

 magnificent bridges have been built — really more than we need. The 

 river has been changed into a real bond of union ; it is the civic center 

 and ornamental part of the city. In those ten years, by cooperative effort, 

 we have done away with the divisions of the city, and we have all the 

 people interested in those things that are of interest to all the people. 

 Des Moines would not have gotten this camp up here away from cities 

 like Minneapolis and Omaha, except for the prompt work of the citizens 

 of Des Moines; and w'e would not have gotten the contract to build it 

 except for that very reason. 



Now, what we have done here in Des Moines is to eliminate lines of 

 division, and that is what seems to me all organized effort is teaching. 

 If you stop to think of it, what is the great American experiment? 

 It is that we have eliminated dividing lines; there are no boundary lines 

 on this western continent. You are never conscious when you cross a 

 line from one county or state into another. Sir James MacDonald said, 

 in an address at the Grant Club, that the three-thousand-mile boundary 

 betv/een Canada and the United States without a single soldier guarding 

 it, was the greatest achievement in the western world. We have eli- 

 minated in this great territory — very much larger than Europe outside 

 of Russia — all boundary lines and all lines of division. The people of 



