258 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



United States are finally coming to realize that 

 there is no sure thing on crops without irrigation 

 that, with this improved mode of farming, they 

 take no chances. This being true, it will be 

 adopted here and there throughout the country 

 until gradually this safe means will become gen- 

 eral. The great success of farming on former arid 

 lands in the Western States by irrigation is edu- 

 cating the farmers and the people of the nation. 

 Ponulatinfi ^ * B ev ident that the people and 

 Western the State officials of the Western 

 America, states generally have come to real- 

 ize that the best efforts of their live and enter- 

 prising home newspapers must not be depended 

 upon as the sole means of directing immigration 

 their way. Settlers are coming in, but, consider- 

 ing the increased and immense immigration to the 

 United States the past year from the Old World, 

 the farm settlers have not come West in sufficient 

 numbers, and all because the merits of these 

 Western States are not properly made known at 

 the landing places of these pilgrims to the New 

 Worli. Besides following the example of Kansas, 

 and sending exhibits of their crops and resources 

 through the whole country every now and then on 

 special trains, it is now proposed to have special 

 State or Territorial agents in each of the principal 

 cities to which European immigrants are ticketed, 

 who shall have offices provided with maps and 

 charts, exhibits, etc., and who, provided with good 

 credentials so that people can trust them, shall 



duly advertise and make known the advantages of 

 their sections to the new homeseekers. In a 

 word, it is proposed to bring this business of 

 populating Western America down to business 

 methods, and this is as it should be. 



If there were no foreign immigrants at all, farm- 

 ers are constantly changing location, being either 

 dissatisfied or desiring to enlarge their operations, 

 or to more diversify their operations, and these 

 are to be secured. It is apparent on every hand, 

 and undeniable, that there is great dissatisfaction 

 among the farmers of the great Central States, 

 and, while many of them will irrigate and diver- 

 sify their industry where they are, many more are 

 looking out for new locations where they can 

 make a living without working such large areas of 

 territory. With their present single one or two 

 kinds of crops a year, if they mature safely, there 

 is in the aggregate an over supply and the prices 

 realized do not pay, and if there is a drought 

 there are no crops and no pay. It is a non-paying 

 feast or an outright famine with them. Great in- 

 ducements are held out to these people to go 

 South, but, considering the health of themselves 

 and their unacclimated families, they are hes- 

 itating. 



Established offices in the principal eastern sea- 

 port cities, and colonization agents there and 

 through the central cities of the continent will be 

 found to make big returns, and prove the proper 

 means of rapidly populating Western America. 



