THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



VAL VERDE TRACT AND FERRIS VALLEY, FROM KNOLL NEAR THE CITY. 



amount of water available for irrigation imposes a 

 limitation even more severe. Nature has limited the 

 amount of water and land in Southern California, but 

 nothing can limit the population which must live 

 here in the future. Year after year the stream 

 swells in volume, and so long as this tender sky 

 bends above these rugged, snow-capped mountains, 

 uniting in a single picture the charm of summer and 

 the majesty of winter, so long will the army of home- 

 seekers, searching for an earthly paradise, march 

 steadily into these valleys of our far Southwest. This 

 means constantly enhancing land values. The 

 demand for land must increase, but the supply can- 

 not increase. So the person who buys at present 

 prices knows that twenty years hence, the inevitable 

 increase of population will have multiplied the value 

 of his land, even if he has not improved it in the 

 meantime. 



THE VERY BEST IN CALIFORNIA. 



The present selling price of land in Southern Cali- 

 fornia varies a good deal. Where it is cheap it is 

 generally remote from transportation facilities, or the 

 water supply is problematical. Even in such locali- 

 ties the price generally ranges from $50 to $100 per 

 acre. In established communities having the advan- 

 tages of railroads and completed irrigation works the 

 price is generally from $100 to $300 an acre. This is 

 before the plow touches the soil. Improved land in 

 bearing orchards is worth from $500 to $1,000, and 

 upward. These are the general conditions. But 

 there happens to be one place in the most fertile and 

 beautiful part of Southern California, where all the 



advantages of low prices are combined with the cer- 

 tainties of railroad and existing water supplies and 

 an established community. If there is another such 

 place in Southern California proper, it is unknown 

 to the writer. The place referred to is the Val Verde 

 tract in the heart of Ferris valley, which is within 

 about fifteen miles of the famous orange colonies of 

 Redlands and Riverside. Nowhere is the soil more 

 fertile, the lay of the land more favorable, the climate 

 more genial, and the surrounding mountain scenery 

 more inspiring. The Santa Fe railroad runs through 

 the center of it, and best of all, the entire tract is 

 piped with water from the great Bear Valley reser- 

 voir, thirty-five miles away, in the San Bernardino 

 mountains. The city of Ferris is within fifteen min- 

 utes' drive, and Los Angeles itself is but seventy 

 miles to the westward. And land in the Val Verde 

 tract, with all these advantages, is selling to-day 

 for sif/j per acre ! There is nothing like it for the 

 price in the United States, and nothing superior at 

 any price anywhere, even in Southern California. 



THE MAN BEHIND IT. 



Wherever there is a colony in Southern California 

 there will be found a brain and heart behind it. This 

 section is peculiar in that respect. Some adventurous 

 spirit sees for the first time, as in a vision, the possi- 

 bilities of a certain valley through which perhaps 

 many thousand men, as unthinking as their horses 

 have ridden before. Such men are essentially dis- 

 coverers. They say to themselves, " What a beautiful 

 valley! How I would like to water it and make it 



