170 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



had the general interest sunk at that time that it was not thought 

 possible that anything could be accomplished, and had there not 

 been women in the federation ready to keen up the struggle it might 

 have ended there. The memorial asked simply for a congressional 

 investigation and the continued withdrawal of the land and pine from 

 sale, but the arguments used in support of it before the legislature by 

 the representative of the federation, who appeared in its behalf, out- 

 lined the stand they had taken and are worthy of notice. The agri- 

 cultural land, which meant all land not growing pine, was conceded 

 to be thrown open for settlement. The timber upon the pine land 

 was to be cut and used but not without restriction, as formerly. The 

 Chief of the Bureau of Forestry should be placed in charge of the 

 cutting, and the pine land should be held as a forest reserve. Third- 

 ly, the beauty spots should be saved from the axe ; the groves about 

 the lakes and islands should be made into parks unreservedly. 



That this stand was taken then publicly by the federation and 

 had existed in their minds for some time, cannot be too strongly em- 

 phasized, for these principles formed the basis of the compromise 

 bill which was passed the following winter, by which the reserve was 

 finally secured ; and that the federation alone, of all bodies interested, 

 were farsighted enough to take this stand at an early date must be 

 reckoned immensely to their credit, the more so as it apparently in- 

 volved a greater sacrifice than turned out to be the case. Figures 

 obtained through the office of the state fire warden had indicated 

 that out of some 611,000 acres of land only a little over 100,000 

 acres were pine lands, and the rest was either Indian allotments or 

 agricultural land. During the formation of the final bill, it was 

 found that the pine lands amounted to 250,000 acres or more, and a 

 limit of 200,000 acres was placed upon the amount to be held as a 

 reserve. But the women were willing to stand by their platform if 

 the pine lands had only amounted to 100,000 acres, and were criti- 

 cised for it even by the medical societies, a prominent and repre- 

 sentative member of which said, even after the passage of the bill, 

 that he thought that the women had receded too far when they only 

 asked for 100,000 acres. By their fruits ye shall know them. 



The crisis came last winter and was recognized as such by the 

 local and Indian interests and by the federation. The situation was 

 intolerable, and something had to be done, and had the old vague 

 plan of a national park been all that the park people had to ofifer at 

 that time it would have been consigned to oblivion, and the original 

 Morris bill would probably have passed. But the modified plan 

 would not down. Mr. Morris' original bill contained two excellent 

 features, the sale of the pine by actual scale of the log and not on 

 estimate, and the separation of the pine land from the pine. But 

 this pine land was to have been thrown open for settlement, and 

 there was no reservation made for parks nor any regulation of the 

 cut looking to the perpetuation of the forest. Before he introduced 

 this bill he realized that it would not get the united support of the 

 Minnesota delegation, as certain of the other members were suffi- 

 ciently imbued with the earnestness and sense of the forest reserve 

 demands as to insist on some measure looking to that end. The con- 



