32 The Condition of the Western Farmer. [310 



assessment rolls for '73 show no one in this township 

 taxed as the owner of land, but twenty-two persons were 

 assessed as the owners of personal property. During this 

 year none but " sod crops " were raised, and, fortunately, 

 the grasshoppers, so bad throughout the state as a whole, 

 did scarcely any damage to the crops in Harrison township, 

 so that the farmers were permitted to gather in whatever 

 grain the newly opened soil could furnish. The one man 

 who left during this year is said to have been a gambler 

 and speculator who had come to the country with some 

 vague idea of making a fortune in the immediate future, 

 but who soon tired of even his nominal residence on a farm 

 and sought more agreeable fields. 



Though the grasshoppers did considerable damage in the 

 state as a whole during 1873, as we have seen, yet their rav- 

 ages were not so great as to cause very high prices for grain 

 in the spring of the following year; nor was immigration to 

 the part of the state which we are considering materially 

 hindered thereby. In fact, in 1874 the number of arrivals in 

 the township was larger than in 1873. Seventeen new settlers 

 came, of whom nine entered upon government land, five on 

 railroad land, and three purchased of older settlers. In this 

 year we find taxes levied for the first time on real property: 

 while thirty-eight persons were taxed on personal property. 

 Owing to the grasshoppers and severe hot winds, the crops 

 this year were very much damaged, the corn being wholly 

 lost, and the small grains yielding less than one-half of an 

 average crop. In consequence many persons were left 

 entirely without means of support except such as they could 

 obtain from the relief associations. 



During 1874, five men gave up their holdings in Harrison 

 township. Two of these were speculators ; one lost his farm 

 through legal complications consequent on mortgaging his 

 personal property too often; a fourth, having no capital, had 

 made no improvements on the land on which he was nomi- 

 nally resident, and had gained his support by working for 

 neighbors, and, although he left as poor as he well could be, 



