and drainage water is secured through a system of 

 canals and pumps. The average investment per 

 rice farm is estimated to be $11,000 to $14,000. In 

 addition to cattle and rice, small acreages of cotton, 

 corn, and other forage crops are grown. Producers 

 of dairy, poultry, and truck products find a ready 

 market in the Houston and Beaumont areas. 



The upland timbered counties make up a section 

 of small, scattered farms. The chief crops are 

 cotton, corn, and hay, but some truck crops also 

 are produced; Livingston in Polk County being a 

 shipping center for tomatoes. Cattle, horses, 

 mules, and hogs are raised, although the number of 

 the latter has decreased since 1930. Cash income 

 from farm woodlands in Polk County amounted to 

 $60 per farm during 1930. Broadly speaking, the 

 upland soil is not well adapted to agriculture, most 

 of the farms being on little more than a subsistence 



basis. 



POWER 



Fuel supplies consisting of petroleum, natural 

 gas, and lignite are readily available. Oil fields 

 in the unit produced 34 million barrels in 1935. 

 The principal gas fields supplying southeast Texas 

 are those in Harrison and Panola Counties, to- 

 gether with the Monroe field in Louisiana. De- 

 posits of lignite, roughly estimated at 30 billion 

 tons, are within short shipping distance of the unit. 

 It is estimated that 95 percent of the electric power 

 used in the State is generated from fuel in plants 

 such as those at Houston, Beaumont, and Trinidad. 



INDUSTRIES 



The oil industry with its related activities is the 

 most important one at the present time. In 1935 

 the 34 million barrels of oil produced within this 

 area had an approximate value of $34,000,000 

 before refining, and was worth an additional 

 $8,000,000 refined. Houston, Beaumont, and 

 Port Arthur are the important refining centers. 

 More than 20 pipe lines bring crude oil to these 

 three cities, the storage capacity at Beaumont and 

 Port Arthur exceeding 50 million barrels. Lumber- 

 men and others retaining their land for timber 

 growth find that oil leases or royalties furnish wel- 

 come financial aid between cutting periods. 



Most of the remaining industries are concen- 

 trated in the large coastal cities. At Houston are 

 located foundries and machine shops, railroad 

 shops, cement and chemical plants, cotton com- 



presses, flour mills, packing plants, and a large 

 pulp mill. Although chiefly an oil-refining center, 

 Beaumont has foundries and machine shops, rice 

 mills, and cotton compresses. Lufkin, in Angelina 

 County, is an important producer of oil-field ma- 

 chinery. The forest industries will be treated in 

 detail later. 



TAXES 



In 1931, the total real property taxes per $100 

 of assessed valuation averaged $4.93. According 

 to Texas law, the assessed valuation should be the 

 true and full value, but in practice the assessment 

 varies from 10 percent to over 100 percent of the 

 full value. Timber and land are assessed together, 

 cut-over land having an assessed valuation of 

 about $5 per acre, while that of land with timber 

 generally ranges from $5 to $10. In Polk County 

 in 1929, taxes paid by 16 lumber companies 

 averaged 21 cents per acre on land and timber, 

 the highest tax being for land with old-growth 

 timber at 24 cents and the lowest at 13 cents for 

 land partly stocked to second growth. This is an 

 approximate rate of 30 mills per dollar of assessed 

 value. 



Tax delinquency varies in individual counties. 

 In 1934, in Jefferson, Tyler, and Liberty Counties, 

 less than 3 percent of the lands were in tax default 

 for 3 or more years. In other counties the figure 

 was as high as 33 percent, with 15 percent the 

 average for 16 counties of the unit. The degree of 

 tax default, which is not necessarily an indication 

 of land abandonment by private owners, varies 

 with the prevailing prosperity of the section. 

 Owing to the possibility of discovering oil on much 

 of the land, taxes are often paid on land that is at 

 present unproductive, with the hope of obtaining 

 a return in the future. Some lumber companies 

 are also holding their forest land, feeling that a 

 profit can be made through continuous yields on a 

 management basis, even though land taxes are 

 relatively high. 



LAND OWNERSHIP 



Large ownerships of land are common. Lumber 

 companies are the most important large holders, 

 33 companies having controlled more than 2 

 million acres in 1929. Other landholding com- 

 panies, however, also own large acreages; and a 

 subsidiary of a large oil company owns nearly a 

 tenth of the total land area in the unit. Oil com- 



