96 INDIANA HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS 

 Western Agriculture — Corn Cobs. 



[New York American Agriculturist, 6:338-39; Nov., 1847'] 



[July, 1847] 



I made a flying visit to our old friend Henry L. Ells- 

 worth,- of Patent Office memory, one day last month. He 

 is now a resident of La Fayette, Indiana, where he is 

 farming pretty largely on the Wea Prairie, about seven 

 miles out, on which he has a thousand acres of Indian 

 corn in one field. The uncommon high price of corn this 

 summer,^ has been the moving cause of growing many 

 an extra acre of it in the Wabash Valley, where, if it 

 ripens well, it will tell a pleasing tale, not only to the 

 cultivators, but to the starving millions of Europe. 



Mr. Ellsworth is as full of enthusiasm as ever, and no 

 less busy than he was in his office at Washington. He is 

 an owner and manager of a vast amount of land, which 

 he is selling, leasing, and improving, and which, together 

 with all the business operations that he is carrying on, 

 keeps his office crowded with the multitudes who deal 

 with him. Yet he finds time to be continually trying 

 some experiment, or studying out some improvements 

 for the benefit of the agricultural community. 



I saw six pigs in as many pens, just big enough to hold 

 each occupant without exercise, which he was feeding on 

 corn in the ear, corn ground, but fed raw, and corn-meal 

 made into mush — two upon each kind. The pigs were 

 all alike in age, breed, size, and weight, when commenced 

 with, and after being fed a certain time with carefully- 

 weighed quantities of food, they are re-weighed and 

 weights noted, and then those which had been fed upon 

 one kind, are changed to another and so on; and when 

 the experiment is finished, he assured me he would pub- 



' Reprinted in part in Michigan Farmer, 6:45 (February 1, 1848). 



'See Robinson, l:213n and Index. 



' On June 27, 1847, shelled corn was quoted at 35 cents to 38 

 cents a bushel in Chicago, as against 23 cents to 25 cents a bushel 

 on June 27, 1846. Prairie Farmer, 6:232 (July, 1846), 7:232 (July, 

 1847). 



