86 THE FARMER OF TO-MORROW 



And what did it cost ? 



It cost $9.31 an acre! Spread out thin in 

 ten annual instalments. The pumping plant 

 is maintained at a small cost pro rata, like a 

 cooperative irrigation system. One pump 

 handles the spring floods very easily. Gravity 

 takes care of the drainage during the normal 

 stages of the river. 



The former amphibians no longer dread the 

 spring rains. Every shower washes down the 

 fertile silt of the highly capitalized Iowa 

 prairie up on the bluff, to add to the bank 

 account of Oakville. Therefore Oakville, dry- 

 shod, has become capitalized itself and has 

 built a railroad to tap this miniature Holland 

 in America north and south. 



This and hundreds of other similar com- 

 munities that have been reclaimed from muck 

 beds since the beginning of the end of free 

 land came in sight are the anomalies of a 

 rapidly expanding industry. In dollars and 

 cents returns, these reclaimed areas present 

 sensational results. Their owners find rail- 

 roads, markets, all the advantages that have 

 served to capitalize prairie acres at figures 

 ranging to and beyond $150, and the deep beds 



