THE IKfilGATION AGE. 



639 



With the present issue IRRIGATION AGE 

 Irrigation Age . . 



_ rounds out a period of twenty-six years 



Twenty-six Years 



AJ , as an advocate of progressive ideas in 



an Advocate of _, 



agriculture. For more than a quarter of 



Progressive , . , . , , 



j , a century this paper has labored to pro- 



mulgate the principles of irrigation and 

 intensive farming as a means of advancing the nation's 

 prosperity and elevating agriculture to the dignity of a 

 business. 



While IRRIGATION AGE has prospered and attained a 

 circulation and influence never reached by another paper 

 of its c\asf, we believe it proper to say that there are 

 many persons enjoying benefits from our publicity efforts 

 who have been remiss in aiding and supporting this or 

 any other publication devoted to the principles for which 

 we have labored. 



This being the oldest and most widely read of all 

 irrigation papers, it is our right and duty to say that 

 neither the government officials, the railroads nor the 

 manufacturing companies which produce irrigation ma- 

 chinery, have given proper support to publications like 

 this, which steadily and intelligently push the propaganda 

 of an artificial water supply in American agriculture. 

 Most of our patronage has come from individual sub- 

 scribers who understood the importance of the work. Some 

 who have had the most to gain from the development of 

 the semi-arid portions of the country failed to grasp the 

 issue, and hence all developments have been too slow 

 for the good of the public. 



It is true that irrigation is making headway, but it 

 is equally true that it would have advanced much more 

 rapidly had all western bankers, railroad companies and 

 manufacturers taken an active instead of a passive inter- 

 est in the subject. In the quarter of a century of its 

 existence IRRIGATION AGE has absorbed a half-dozen pub- 

 lications of decided merit, which were struggling to do 

 what we have done in spreading the important principles 

 which underlie our efforts. All of these starving journals 

 ought to have had support from advertisers and the read- 

 ing public, and in almost any other line of endeavor they 

 would have received a more liberal patronage. 



There is no kind of enterprise connected with the 

 development of our western states that has needed prin- 

 ters' ink and publicity any more than has irrigation. The 

 interest requires specific and technical knowledge, and not 

 the haphazard views of journalists who present an occa- 

 sional article on the theme. We repeat, that those who. 

 are the gainers by the spread of irrigation propaganda * 

 should be more enterprising in their patronage of pub- 

 lications like IRRIGATION AGE. There is a mighty work yet 

 to be done, and they should assist. 



In this connection we wish to warn irrigationists to 

 keep politics out of their business affairs and conventions. 

 When men are found to be pushing themselves forward in 

 this cause for self-aggrandizement rather than for the 

 advancement of irrigation princples, it would be well to 

 give them the cold shoulder and a back seat. There is 

 no place for petty politics in this great national move- 

 ment. Let us build up the irrigation systems of the various 

 states in a business-like way. The personal schemes of 

 rings and cliques are plainly dangerous. They are inim- 

 ical to the best interests of an important cause. Get rid 

 of them and keep clear of them. 



IRRIGATION AGE has had an uphill fight, but it has won 

 the battle. This paper is now recognized in a national 



sense as an authority in its particular field. Probably it 

 will be better supported and will accomplish more for the 

 public in the next quarter century than it has in the past. 

 One thing is certain, the great work of irrigating the 

 semi-arid sections of the country has only fairly begun. 

 There ought to be harmonious and spirited action from 

 this time on, and every year ought to see tangible results 

 accomplished. We hope to lead in this work more ener- 

 getically than ever, for our enthusiasm never was higher, 

 and we hope for a spirit of cordial co-operation on the 

 part of many who have so far only extended their help 

 in a half-hearted manner. 



THE ARKANSAS VALLEY. 



BY R. E WALLACE. 



THE writer recalls that in the school days of long ago, 

 he was subject to a reprimand for taking too big a 

 subject in essay writing; that is, it was a topic that 

 could not be covered by one small individual in one small 

 essay. He has a little of the same feeling that he is tack- 

 ling a big subject when he is writing on the Arkansas 

 Valley in eastern Colorado. It is a big subject, and needs 

 to be treated in a big way. 



The developments of the Arkansas Valley have been 

 remarkable in the last few months. The attention of 

 people in the east has been generally directed toward that 

 valley for several reasons. First, its fertility, and second, 

 its water supply, the first of course being contingent on 

 the second. 



Someone has been gifted with enough of sentiment to 

 speak of this valley as "a heart of gold in a ribbon of 

 green," and this is a feature of agricultural conditions 

 that impresses itself on 'one's mind, whether he be a poet 

 or _one of the plain people. The vast fields of alfalfa, 

 which flourish so vigorously in the valley, make it indeed 

 a vast ribbon of green. One is prone to question whether 

 there is a market for such quantities of alfalfa as are 

 grown in the Arkansas Valley, but a little investigation, a 

 few talks with the people who live there, set one's mind 

 at rest on that score. 



The writer talked with a Mississippi planter a few 

 weeks ago, who was disposed to be pessimistic on the 

 matter of raising so much alfalfa. He declared that the 

 vast fields of this crop growing in the west and now begin- 

 ning to appear in the south, would soon flood the market, 

 and that prices would drop away down, possibly as low 

 as those which prevailed during the panic days of 1892 

 and 1893. Not so, however, with the optimists of Colo- 

 rado, and men who are growing alfalfa in the Arkansas 

 Valley. They have no such fears, and need have none. 

 Aside from its being a crop that is bringing wealth into 

 every community, it is also, as is well known, bringing to 

 the soil those millions of atoms and pounds of nitrogen 

 with which the air is filled, and if there should ever be an 

 over-production of alfalfa, it could soon be turned over, 

 and put into the soil in a way that will bring other crops 

 fully as profitable. 



Not many portions of the west are as well favored in 

 their water systems as is the Arkansas Valley of eastern 

 Colorado. The Fort Lyon and Amity systems are prac- 

 tically a unit, and are caring for the farms dependent upon 

 them in a way that is beyond criticism. It is a peculiar, 

 fact that in many of the localities the water systems or the 

 managers of same, are subject to much criticism, and liti- 

 gation seems to sprout every time water is turned into a 

 ditch. With both the Fort Lyon and Amity peace and 

 quiet reigns, and the managers are working in harmony. 

 The reservoirs of these systems are large enough to be 

 called inland seas. Reference has been made to them in 

 the columns of THE IRRIGATION AGE in a previous issue. 

 The priority of the water rights is as firmly fixed and as 

 secure as the rights of any irrigation system in the west, 

 and the best attorneys have passed upon these facts. 



Of course there are other crops with which the Ar- 

 kansas Valley is favored besides that of alfalfa, as men- 

 tioned above. The grain crops, wheat in particular, being 

 very prolific, a record having been made this last season 

 of 69 bushels to the acre, and the growing of sugar beets 

 and of melons is as profitable as in other parts of Colorado. 



