238 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



70,000 more people would find a living 

 there so soon as such power was used for 

 all the land these waters would irrigate. 

 As soon as the county developed in this 

 way villages would grow into cities; 

 blacksmiths into machinists; retailers into 

 wholesalers; schools into colleges; and 

 colleges into universities. 



To preserve this opportunity until the 

 people should be aroused to the import- 

 ance of action, Dr. Blowers not only 

 thought, spoke and wrote, but although 

 seriously ill he could not be dissuaded 

 from attending the Los Angeles Conven- 

 tion of ' 93 when he felt that there was 

 danger that Congress would be asked 

 to turn over arid lands and reservoir sites 

 to the States and make it possible 

 for Legislatures to take such action as 

 would place the opportunities of the 

 many under the control of the few. 



When action was pending in the Legis- 

 lature designed to complicate action by 

 declaring the lake the property of Lake 

 County he telegraphed a request to the 

 governor that he withhold his signature 

 until a Woodland delegation would reach 

 him, and this friend of the people rose 

 from his death-bed, long after he had 

 ceased to attend to any private affair, to 

 solicit his fellow citizens personally, to 

 wait upon the governor and use their in- 

 fluence for their county in that crisis. 



Not often do we find one, upon whom 

 no official responsibility rests, so zealous 

 for the public good as to place others' in- 

 terests before his own even to the last 

 day of his life. 



He spoke of approaching death as a 

 pleasant journey, and well he might. For 

 one who has lived so much for others knows 

 what the preacher meant when he said: 

 "It is only three steps to Heaven; out of 

 self unto Christ into glory." 



By precept and practice he was a firm 

 believer in intensive farming, and held 

 that the development of the country rested 

 upon small holdings of irrigated land. He 

 claimed that ten acres of good land, well 

 cultivated, would employ and sustain an 

 average family on a scale of comfort to 

 enable them to live as intelligent, self-sus- 

 taining, public- spirited citizens. 



His first prune orchard was seven-eighths 

 of an acre. The first five years after it 

 came into bearing he marketed 5,700, 

 6,700, 7,700, 8, 700 and 7,200 respectively, 

 being an average of 7,200 pounds of mer- 



chantable prunes for a term of five years. 

 He estimated that ten acres of such land 

 as his would produce 100 tons of alfalfa 

 hay annually or keep twelve COWP, ten 

 hogs and 200 hens. If devoted to sugar- 

 beets it would produce 300 tons. On his 

 own home ranch are kept a dozen cows, 

 twenty or thirty dozen chickens, forty to 

 fifty hogs and eight horses. 



The balance of the place, not required 

 for stock, is planted with seedless raisins 

 and shipping grapes, olives, prunes and 

 apricots. Many of these are young trees, 

 planted between rows of vines, so soon as 

 he foresaw the effect of free-trade upon the 

 raisin industry. 



To colonists he would recommend the 

 care of stock and fruit so distributed as to 

 keep working members of the family al- 

 ways occupied, but never crowded. With 

 irrigated land and small holdings they 

 would be close enough together to have 

 common drying grounds, fruit-shipping 

 stations, creameries, canneries, etc. Each 

 family could have milk and eggs to send 

 to the creamery every day, could have 

 flowers and vegetables to use and spare, 

 and when fruit harvest came could have 

 pears, peaches, prunes, apricots or grapes, 

 figs, almonds, olives, oranges or lemons to 

 sell. With products to market that bring 

 cash every day they would be in a position 

 to buy for cash and avoid the system of 

 credits that has proven the ruin of many 

 new settlers. 



For several months Dr. and Mrs. Blow- 

 ers represented the State Board of Trade 

 upon "California on Wheels," and met 

 many in the east whom they had enter- 

 tained during excursions of representative 

 bodies to California. All were greatly in- 

 terested in the exhibit. 



The present world-wide depression has 

 so affected prices that the low margin of 

 profit generally connected with safe busi- 

 ness, affording constant employment, has 

 temporarily been upon the wrong side of 

 the ledger. Some reason that existing 

 conditions are likely to become permanent 

 and that the farmer of the future will be- 

 come a peon. Conditions have never re- 

 mained the same for any term of years in 

 our history, and it is only by averaging 

 results of decades that we can reach safe 

 data from which to estimate prosperity of 

 a vocation. 



Accounts show that for the twenty-six 

 years Dr. Blowers farmed his eighty-acre 



