beginning, people of small means, or of no means at all, have earned places 

 for themselves from which they now derive a steady, comfortable income. 



The soil of Kings County is alluvial in character, having been slowly 

 washed down for countless centuries by the Kings River and the Kings 

 River Slough, and deposited in the form of fine silt, on which vegetation 

 sprang up and decayed and then was buried under the wash. It is sandy 

 and porous in quality, which enables the horticulturist to practice a form 

 of irrigation that is rarely used in other sections of the State. This is 

 called irrigation by seepage. 



The chief export products of Kings County are grain (including wheat, 

 barley and corn), alfalfa, livestock of all kinds, wool, raisins, prunes, 

 peaches, apricots, pears, apples, table and wine grapes, dairy products, 

 nectarines, cherries, figs, almonds, wine, canned goods, and vegetables. 



The present exportation of livestock amounts to over $850,000 per 

 annum. This includes hogs, beef cattle, sheep, and horses. Poultry inter- 

 ests are of considerable importance. Dairying is becoming a leading factor 

 In agricultural wealth, and with the great advantages afforded for the 

 abundant growth of alfalfa, combined with native grasses, the county is 

 particularly adapted to the dairy industry. Land for dairying can be pur- 

 chased here at from $25 to $50 per acre, and it is stated that forty acres 

 of good land will support a dairy of forty cows with their calves, and 

 horses enough to carry on the place. 



An acre of alfalfa, properly irrigated, will produce in one year from 

 five to six tons of hay worth $5 per ton, and in addition thereto will pasture 

 four head of cows for six months. Many of the irrigated peach orchards 

 annually produce twelve tons per acre of green fruit; and prune, pear, and 

 apricot, nectarine, plum, and almond orchards in like proportion. 



Hanford is the county seat and the chief center of trade. This city 

 has a population of 4,800, and is steadily growing. It is one of the most 

 prosperous towns in the State, and has electric lights and power, gas plant 

 for ifuel and lights, ice factory, flour-mill, planing-mill, winery of large 

 capacity, many fruit-packing houses, marble and granite works. 



The next city of importance in Kings County is Lemoore, nine miles 

 west of Hanford. It is a thriving town of about 2,000 people, and is a 

 business center of growing importance surrounded by a developing country 

 which irrigation and tilth will make a beehive of industry. 



Corcoran, the new town located on the Santa Fe Railroad sixteen 

 miles south of Hanford, is the center of the great developing country of 

 the Tulare Lake region. 



Kings County is pre-eminently the desirable home for the agriculturist. 

 Here the stock-raiser is in his element. The fields produce feed the year 

 round for cattle, horses, hogs, sheep, and poultry. Alfalfa Is the chief 

 forage plant, and produces four or five cuttings annually. The experienced 

 farmer on irrigated land takes off a crop of wheat and barley and then 

 irrigates the same and plants it to corn, and the average crop of corn is 

 two tons to the acre and it sells readily at twenty dollars per ton. 



There is plenty of good land to be had in Kings County at reasonable 

 figures, and the demand for labor is so continuous that the settler with 

 limited capital, will experience no difficulty in getting a fair start. 



Contra Costa County 



CONTRA COSTA COUNTY is one of the central counties in California, 

 the shore line being within fourteen miles of San Francisco. Its bound- 

 aries are: On the north by the San Pablo and Suisun bays, the Straits 

 of Carquinez, and the San Joaquin River; on the east by Old River, 

 separating it from San Joaquin County; on the south by Alameda 

 County; and on the west by San Francisco Bay, the county having seventy 

 miles of water-front, nearly all of which is upon deep water, navigable by 



13 



