County, located in the South foot-hills of the Adirondack section 

 of the State. Several years ago our company acquired by purchase 

 two thousand acres, containing several acres of so-called farm land 

 that had not been worked for agricultural purposes except in a hap- 

 hazard way for several years because it was unprofitable for farming 

 purposes. Forty, 50, or 60 years ago this land was the pioneer 

 dairying section of New York. The first cheese factory built in the 

 State of New York, as I understand, was in Herkimer County, in 

 this immediate vicinity; and the largest dairying herds per square 

 mile fifty, seventy-five or eighty years ago were grazing on this very 

 land that I refer to now. As our industries developed and trans- 

 portation was developed, connecting us with the New York Central 

 Lines, the purchase of farm foods and dairy products became a serious 

 problem, our base of operations being several miles from a purchas- 

 ing market. Therefore, of necessity, to supply this demand I de- 

 termined five years ago in a measure to provide the necessaries of 

 life in the way of farm, food and dairy products for our operatives, 

 and made an effort to reclaim the abandoned lands which had grown 

 over with a wild growth of weeds and brush. There having been no 

 'stock kept in the barn we were without fertilizer available. I purchased 

 a carload of so-called commercial fertilizer, engaged the services of 

 a local farmer, and began to break up this soil. Our first year's 

 experience was far from satisfactory. A thirty-acre field produced 

 less than 20 bushels per acre ; a five-acre field of potatoes less than 

 fifty bushels per acre; a ten-acre field of silo corn, less than ten 

 tons to the acre; a five-acre field of yellow corn failed to materialize 

 and was cut and put in with the silo. It was then that we realized 

 the importance of personally taking up these matters of land culti- 

 vation. I at once procured State and Government bulletins on special 

 crop cultivation, subscribed to several agricultural papers, and decided 

 to stock the farm with live stock to the capacity of the barn build- 

 ings available. I purchased about 100 head of horses, cows, sheep 

 and hogs, in order to procure an abundance of barn-yard manure, 

 purchasing hay and grain to carry this stock through the first winter. 

 I looked up commercial fertilizers, nitrate of soda, potash, etc., all 

 of which we purchased in carload lots, and mixed them into our 

 own, and judiciously and freely spread this mixture on the soil, with 

 the barn-yard fertilizer that had accumulated during the winter. Mark 

 the increase in the yield per acre! Oats, 56 bushels per acre, as 

 against less than 20. Potatoes over 200 bushels to the acre; 25 to 

 30 tons of silo. Corn, 46 bushels of ear corn to the acre; 50 tons, 



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