EAST TEXAS. 35 



and the result has been that the increase of population has not even 

 been normal. Far more people have left than have come on and been 

 born put together. People who don't know East Texas, and their name 

 is legion, will say it is because nothing can be raised there. 



Let us see as to that: 



The cotton production in Texas in 1910 was an average per county 

 of 12,396. The average of the thirty East Texas counties was 12,768, 

 or 372 bales above the average. The production per capita of popula- 

 tion was slightly in excess of three-fourths of a bale (1200 pounds) of 

 seed cotton, including the black lands and river lands held at from 

 $50 to $100 an acre. The production per capita of the thirty East 

 Texas counties was a slight fraction less than two-thirds of a bale (1066 

 pounds) on land held at from $5 to $25 per acre. 



The thirteen cotton-farming States produced, in 1910-11, 13,617,409 

 bales. Had they produced in the same ratio that the thirty East Texas 

 counties did, they would have produced 18,000,000 bales. 



The thirty Eas^Texas counties contain approximately 9^ per cent 

 of the area of the State. They produced slightly in excess of 12^ per 

 cent of the cotton crop of the State, besides corn, cotton, sorghum, sugar 

 cane, milo maize, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, Irish potatoes, peanuts, 

 broom corn, watermelons, cantaloupes, peas, blackberries, dewberries, 

 strawberries, and more vegetables with less work than any other nation 

 in the world. 



Official figures furnished me by the freight departments of four lines 

 of railroad show that from not exceeding fifteen counties of East Texas,, 

 mostly from eight, there were shipped, in the season of 1912, 6976 car- 

 loads of peaches and vegetables, over 4500 being peaches. Tied together,, 

 they would make a train forty-six miles long. In the week ending July 

 27 Henderson county shipped 1269 carloads of peaches, and that is a 

 "poor" East Texas county. 



The longitudinal and latitudinal location of East Texas, its temper- 

 ature, soil and climate combine to enable it to produce more varieties 

 of the fruits of the earth than any other land under heaven. This is 

 as true as Holy Writ. Yet she has only 23 people to the square mile, 

 against 53 in North Texas, and only $7,351,604 of taxable values per 

 county, against $31,816,704 in North Texas. However, while taxable 

 values in North Texas increased in 1911 over 1910 only If per cent, 

 those of East Texas increased nearly 12J per cent. In 1913 the in- 

 crease in North Texas was about 6 per cent, while in East Texas it was 

 approximately 10 per cent. The thirty counties increased in taxable 

 values in 1913 nearly $19,00'0,000. 



The average (mean) temperature of East Texas, taken at Palestine, 

 was for thirtv-three years 65.5. The thirty counties contain in acres 

 16,320,000. 



The 1910 census lists lands as "improved farms and unimproved 

 lands in farm." I take it "improved" means farms enclosed and in 

 actual cultivation, as distinguished from enclosed lands not cultivated, 

 and the whole is given as 3,442,116 acres. This leaves of land enclosed 

 but not actually subjected to cultivation, and virgin land, or land wholly 

 unimprovefl, 12,827,884 acres, or a fraction over 20,000 square miles, 

 an area larger than that of several New England States combined. 



