282 MINNESOTA HISTORICAL SOCIETY COLLECTIONS. 



When I speak of feeding, there is the point. You must do 

 your work intelligently. If you send a half -fed animal to mar- 

 ket, depend upon it that you are not going to get the top price 

 and that you will have to put up with what the other fellow 

 will give you. Last year I had five or six hundred sheep to 

 feed. I did not like to send them to market unless they were 

 in good condition ; I felt that I had a little reputation at stake, 

 and I wanted to send those sheep to market in good order. 

 After feeding them for nearly three months, I think they were 

 as heavy as when I commenced, perhaps a little heavier ; but I 

 got out of it as well as I could, I did not ship them, I was not 

 proud of them at all, and thought I would do better next time. 

 Now, five hundred of them cost me about $7.25 a day to feed. 

 This year I am feeding twelve hundred, and they cost me less 

 than twice as much as the five hundred, but I have an intelli- 

 gent man, and he does not cost me any more than the man I 

 had last year. I think that I got $3.50 for my sheep last year, 

 and I expect to get $5.50 this year. The current price is no 

 higher than it was then, but they will be sent to market in bet- 

 ter order. 



Minnesota has been called a wheat-field, and our farmers 

 have been told that they can only raise wheat successfully. 

 In the older portions of the state, southern Minnesota, that is 

 an exploded idea ; they know better. There was a time when 

 Rochester was the champion wheat market, if not of the world, 

 at least of Minnesota. Later on it traveled up to Red Wing, 

 and that city for a few years was considered the champion 

 wheat market, the largest primary wheat market in the world. 

 Red Wing marketed, I think, in one year, of wheat bought from 

 the farmers on her own streets, something like 1,200,000 bush- 

 els. At the present time I might mention twenty-five places 

 whose names you would not recognize as those of important 

 towns, where they exceed that in the Northwest ; but the wheat 

 market of Red Wing has passed away, and the farmers there 

 are doing other and better things. The farmers in Minnesota 

 can all give their attention to a greater diversity of interests 

 than playing on one string. 



We are glad always that the farmers are able to raise wheat, 

 we are glad they are able to ship large quantities of wheat over 

 our lines of railroad; but unless the raising of wheat is profit- 



