A MIND'S-EYE MAP OF AMERICA 



495 



clown those trees and have been doing so 

 for years until now we have organized 

 what we call a Save - the - Redwoods 

 League, and we hope to raise enough 

 money to save a strip of redwood along 

 the great highway that leads from San 

 Francisco up to the Oregon border, prob- 

 ably, when it is developed, the finest sin- 

 gle bit of coast scenery in the United 

 States, perhaps anywhere, bordered on 

 both sides by these magnificent trees. 



The destruction of these forest giants 

 is a cruel thing. I cannot speak of it 

 without some degree of emotion. Com- 

 mercialism has its benefits, but commer- 

 cialism can be a curse when it destroys 

 things of beauty and things that cannot 

 be replaced. We have saved Yosemite 

 Valley. We have a park called the 

 Sequoia National Park, in which the 

 greatest redwood trees are preserved, and 

 we want to expand that park and give it 

 a new name — make it larger and call it 

 Roosevelt Park. 



THE MOST PRODUCTIVE LAND IN AMERICA 



You go down farther to the edge of 

 Mexico and you will find the Imperial 

 Valley, which was once an inland sea and 

 came very near being an inland sea again 

 ten years ago, when the waters of the 

 Colorado broke through the protecting 

 barriers and flowed down into the valley. 

 Here are 300,000 acres of desert land 

 that now is the most productive single 

 piece of land in this country, because the 

 waters of the Colorado, rising in Wyo- 

 ming and Utah and Colorado, have been 

 brought and turned on to that land. 



Across the way, in Arizona, is another 

 irrigation project — Yuma. Yuma has 

 been noted for but one thing, its heat and 

 the piercing quality of its sand, which 

 drives into your face ; but Yuma is being 

 turned now into one great garden. 



The government recently offered for 

 sale some of the public lands on what is 

 called the Yuma Mesa, and men offered 

 $250 and $260 an acre for that land, 

 barren as it is, but with the water right 

 promised for the future. 



A CAMPAIGNER IN THE WEST 



I knew Vice-President Stevenson some- 

 what, and talking one day to a cousin, 

 Judge Ewing, about the success that Ste- 

 venson had made as a campaigner in the 



West, how cleverly he adapted himself 

 to every situation, Ewing told me this 

 story: 



The Vice-President and Judge Ewing 

 had started out from Illinois on a car at- 

 tached to the rear end of a train, and 

 when they reached Missouri Mr. Steven- 

 son came to the back platform, met the 

 multitude, and said ; "My friends, since 

 coming into Missouri and looking into 

 your most intelligent faces and seeing the 

 prosperity that you enjoy, I have de- 

 termined that if I ever change my place 

 of residence I shall adopt yours." 



Ewing continued : "We went over into 

 Kansas, and there the Vice-President 

 said : 'Since coming into Kansas and look- 

 ing at your fields of waving grain and 

 the happiness that is depicted in your 

 faces, I have said to myself, "If I ever 

 change my place of residence I will adopt 

 yours" ' ; and he came into Colorado, and 

 it was the same story there ; and then into 

 New Mexico, and at last to Yuma, Ari- 

 zona ; and in Yuma there was nothing to 

 be seen in the landscape except cactus and 

 sand, and there was nobody to meet us 

 but a group of Indians, and all they wore 

 was a blanket thrown over their shoul- 

 ders, as they huddled in the shade of the 

 depot, and it was 130 degrees in the 

 shade. I thought that the old man would 

 fail there, but he came right to the front, 

 looked down at these Indians with their 

 blankets, and said : 'My friends, since 

 coming to Yuma, and looking upon you, 

 I have decided that if I ever change my 

 style of dress I will adopt yours.' ' : 



And yet that spot — Yuma, the hot, and 

 Yuma, the home of the desert Indians — 

 is a very successful, prosperous business 

 center, surrounded by land that grows 

 oranges and lemons and, to my taste, the 

 best grapefruit grown in the United 

 States. 



THE APACHE INDIAN AS A CITIZEN 



Up above there we have the Salt River 

 project, known because of the Roosevelt 

 Dam ; and that dam was largely built by 

 the Apache Indians. The best Indian 

 (and there are lots of them in all this 

 country of which I am talking) is the 

 Indian that fought us the hardest. He 

 had gimp, he had stuff, he had the con- 

 ception of himself which did not permit 

 him to be conquered, even by the white 



