336 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



LAND OF RIVERS, FRUITS AND GARDENS. 



BY G. L. SHUMWAT. 



The above is appropriate for the "Sunny San 

 Juan," as it has heen called by Judge Pendleton and 

 others. 



Cumbres Pass had forty feet of snow, Toltec Gorge 

 was full of it. It covered San Luis Valley several feet 

 deep, it buried Silverton and Creede, and Durango 

 waded snow incumbered streets, while 50 to 150 miles 

 away the lower valleys of the Animas, La Plata and 

 San Juan rivers were bathed in their almost perpetual 

 sunshine. This was in March, and orchards were in 

 fine condition. Peaches and apricots almost in bloom, 

 pomonas, pears and apples looking excellent. Hereto- 

 fore fruit growers hauled these products fifty miles or 

 more to railroad. Last year the Denver & Eio Grande 

 built a standard gauge from Durango, which augers, we 

 are told, that a standard* gauge will supplant the nar- 

 row gauge scenic line from Alamosa, or the missing 



and refuse to yield their interesting histories. Ancient 

 cliff dwellings frown from Xature's battlements; and 

 here Aztecs dwelt in innumerable thousands, and their 

 ruined minarets, on lookouts overhang the turbid river. 

 Here and there are traces of their old canals, and in 

 the ruins are evidences of husbandry, including quan- 

 tities of parched corn. 



Glad smiles and "Wano, senor," everywhere spoke 

 for the popularity of our guide. We visited Bloom- 

 field and Hammond (Mormon settlements) and Blanco, 

 Largo and Alcatrez (where Mexicans predominate) and 

 ate and slept beneath hospitable Mexican roofs. The 

 commodious domicile of Senor Archaleta contains a 

 parlor of such unique and pleasing design that we 

 each vowed that our next house should contain its 

 counterpart. The farm of Don Archaleta, as does those 

 of Don Juan Jaquez and Don Pachero, proves the pro- 

 ductiveness which Mr. Turley proposes to enlarge by 

 carrying the water to higher mesas, southward toward 

 Lost Angels, El Huerfano, El Huerfanito and Pueblo- 

 Bonita. 



Vista Farmington, N. M. 



link from Creede to Durango will be built, or a wide 

 gauge line will come round the horn and down Canon 

 Largo to unite at Farmington. The Southern Pacific 

 has made some extensive surveys and purchased millions 

 of dollars worth of coal lands in this vicinity, where 

 40-foot veins crop from the bluffs. It is believed they 

 will extend a line to connect with the Kansas Pacific 

 northeast of Pueblo which will make a short line to 

 Los Angeles from Kansas City. 



Legend and story have interwoven romance and 

 poetic nomenclature, so that from the River of Pines 

 to Shiprock Agency the "River wanders thro' the Gar- 

 dens" of the imagination as well as literally. 



Jay Turley, who stands six feet six and throws 

 Mexican like a native, has laid out a life endeavor here 

 which, accomplished, will reclaim 100,000 acres or more 

 and leave to memory a lasting monument, and to un- 

 born generations a heritage inconceivable. Mr. Turley 

 was our escort on a journey over mesas of rare fertility, 

 up a valley rich in possibilities, rich in its crude devel- 

 opment, and rich in archeological interest. 



Here ruined pueblos mark epochs of peace or trag- 

 edy, and dumb walls, builded centuries ago, stand silent 



Westward, adown "Old Age River," or "Male 

 River," as the Indians call it, stands Shiprocks, a famous 

 intrusion that stands a thousand feet high, and Tsate- 

 kahn (where the mountain dips down to the water) 

 marks the spot of another earlier convulsion. 



Aztec is the county seat of San Juan County, but 

 Farmington is the metropolis and the center of popu- 

 lation and of extensive orchards. Strategic and topo- 

 graphic features emphasize the destiny of Farmington 

 as the center of the "Land of Rivers, Fruits and Gar- 

 dens." Situate centrally of the present development, 

 and of probable future development, where the San 

 Juan, Animas and La Plata rivers join, where Farm- 

 ington Glade and Gallego Canon converge, where rich 

 mesas surround it, where rough areas are adorned with 

 pinon and cedar, where one year's peach crop from one 

 and a half acres made $2,200 to producer, where less 

 than a half acre of grapes yielded $500, and where 

 many a more seemingly fantastic tale may truthfully 

 be told. 



Socially and intellectually, Farmington is all right 

 in all that the word implies. 



