Frontier Agriculture In Northern Minnesota 23 
Keewatin drift are usually less acid, hence more desirable, 
than those which have developed on Patrician material. 
4 
On the other hand, areas of sparse settlement and primitive 
farms are correlated with areas of rough, stony, poor-soiled ter- 
minal moraine, and in the lake-dotted central portion of the 
community, with the extremely porous and hence droughty sand 
plains. Many of tlie smaller sparsely-settled or unused areas re- 
flect the presence of swamps, for there are many poorly drained 
areas in both outwash plains and ground moraines. 
These correlations do not apply to the northeastern quarter 
of the community, however. Here settlement is more recent than 
in the remainder of the community. This section, remote from 
Brainerd, and the railroads and main wagon roads which early 
focused on that city, was nearly unpopulated as recently as thirty 
years ago. Almost without exception its farms are primitive to- 
day, and its road-oriented settlement pattern shows, as yet, little 
adjustment to the varying adaptabiHty of the land for agriculture. 
Viewed broadly, the present state of agricultural settlement 
in the Brainerd Community, as sketched in the preceding pages, 
may be summarized in a paragraph. In the portions of the com- 
munity which lie nearest the southern and western boundaries of 
the coniferous forest, there has developed, on the best lands, a 
fairly dense, dispersed agricultural population. The type of 
farming which supports this population is similar to that found 
immediately beyond the borders of the cut-over lands, although 
within the community, yields are lower, and returns less. On the 
poorer lands within this belt, and in the portions of the com- 
munity most remote from the borders of the coniferous forest 
(and from transportation routes) there is a scant population, 
living on small, primitive farms, pioneer settlers on the agricul- 
tural frontier. 
As has already been indicated, much of the experimental 
attested 
