66 Progressive Agriculture 



the long stretch of then uninhabited land 

 running almost from the suburbs of St. Paul, 

 Minnesota to the Pacific coast. Flattering offers 

 were made for its development, and in 1878 the 

 great Dalrymple wheat farm on the fertile level 

 prairies just west of Fargo, of 40,000 acres, sprang 

 suddenly into existence. Other great spring wheat 

 farms followed, ranging down to one and two 

 thousand acres each. Many of the first yields 

 were 35 to 45 bushels per acre, some much less; 

 fortunes, however, were seemingly sure and close 

 at hand, a fact that doubtless led many of us off 

 on the wrong plan of one crop farming. 



Millions of acres of Northern Pacific and Union 

 Pacific lands were soon purchased and thousands 

 of homesteads, preemptions and tree claims of 

 160 acres each, were filed on, and the country 

 from up near the Canadian line down to Okla- 

 homa, filled with eager speculators and home 

 makers. 



Railroads were projected, and for the first time 

 in history they were built into the interior beyond 

 settlement. Cities and towns sprang up like 

 magic, everybody seemingly had money or was 

 going to get it. But there came an end to all this, 

 the history of which we will not repeat. 



The principal factors in all the grief that fol- 

 lowed were the mistakes made in handling the 

 land. We were all strangers in a strange land, 

 there were so many things we did not know. 

 While we do not believe in the one crop farming, 

 yet a wide range of experience convinces us that 

 wheat on a small scale can yet be grown at a profit, 



