Southwest ^1/useum Leaflets 



must be husked, shelled, planted, cultivated, and hilled, usually 

 fertilized, sometimes irrigated, and finally harvested. Other 

 grains, oats for example, have closely related wild relatives 

 such as the two species of wild oats in California, which in ^ 

 hundred years or so have spread through the length of the 

 state. They probably came in as packing in the ships in San 

 Francisco Bay, or in the fleece of Spanish sheep, or with the 

 seed of other grains. 



Not only is corn the most highly developed of all the grains, 

 but because of that fact it is believed by some prominent 

 botanists to be the oldest of all grains; and if this be so, 

 there was a basis for civilization on this hemisphere earlier than 

 anywhere else. 



The Indians developed a great many varieties of corn, which 

 fall into five principal classes — flint corn, dent corn, flour corn, 

 popcorn, and sweet corn. 



Some varieties of corn require 180 days to mature, whereas 

 that developed by the most northerly Indian farmers could be 

 harvested in less than half that time. In some places the cul- 

 tivation of corn was very extensive, Columbus reporting corn- 

 fields 18 miles in length. 



In prehistoric times the distribution of corn extended from 

 Patagonia to Canada. When Columbus, returning to Spain, 

 took some seed corn with him, he was extending the distribu- 

 tion of the crop that was to bring vastly more wealth to the 

 world than all the gold the Spaniards so ruthlessly stole. 



Nowadays, as a world crop, corn probably is exceeded only 

 by rice and potatoes, having surpassed wheat in volume, a 

 fitting climax to the achievement of the prehistoric Indian 

 agriculturists. 



Cotton — Until Columbus came to America, most of the 

 people of the Old World did not have cotton, but dressed in 

 linen, wool, or leather. Before the Christian era, a cotton 

 with a very short staple was indeed known in India, Abyssinia, 

 and some other lands; but the present long-staple cotton of 

 Egypt, the Argentine, Brazil, Peru, Russia, the United States, 

 and other principal growing countries must be credited to the 

 Indians, who developed it from the small wild growths they 

 discovered, probably in Mexico and South America. 



The importance of long staple (staple meaning the cotton 

 fiber) lies in the fact that the longer the staple the stronger 

 the fabric which is manufactured from it. 



Present names for the most important varieties are "Upland" 

 for a medium long-staple cotton, and "Sea Island" for an ex- 



