DRY FARMING CONGRESS. 



43 



wheat there won't be any profit in it. and you will drive me out of business." 

 (Laughter.) And he really felt very bad about it. 



That reminds me of what I heard on the train, going up to Boise, 

 Idaho, to the sheep convention. The train was loaded with sheepmen, and 

 we ran b}- a sugar factorj-, and the question came up about raising sugar 

 beets, and we were commenting upon the material gain that this state 

 had incurred through the raising of sugar beets, and the more I said the 

 madder the sheepman got. He kept getting madder and madder. I could 

 not think what was wrong with him. I didn't understand. Finally he said, 

 ''The\' are just simph' ruining this country." He says, 'Tt is the worst 

 thing that ever happened. Wh}'. before these sugar beets came into this 

 countr}- I could buy all the lucern hay I wanted at two dollars a ton, and 

 now," he says, "I have to pay four and six." (Applause.) And that is the 

 wa}- he looked at it; and that is the way the old man looked at it. But that 

 old man's land now. that he raised wheat on for forty A'-ears and didn't 

 make very much, is probably raising sugar beets and netting him three or 

 four times as much per acre as it did when he was raising wheat, or may 

 be he has planted it in orchard and is making ten or twenty or even forty 

 times as much per acre as he ever did before. (Applause.) And the great 

 state of Utah is getting revenue from the increased production of the arid 

 farm land; getting revenue from the increase of production of irrigated 

 land, and getting revenue from the increased value of both arid and irri- 

 gated land. And just as true as I stand here is it that the introduction o{ 

 any new industry in agricultural line in an}' community will help further 

 the industr}' in the community, unless it be something inimical, like smelter 

 smoke, perhaps, or something like that. But in a general way that will be 

 true, and the state — you count the measure of value to a state by the de- 

 velopment of a single industry', by the revenue of that single industry alone. 

 It means a great deal more to a state than dollars and cents in revenue, in 

 the sale of land, from taxes from the increased price of the land or anything 

 of that kind. Yes. it means one thing that means a great deal more than 

 all of those put together; it means an increased farming population, whicH 

 the gentleman from Colorado this afternoon told you, I think, was the 

 foundation of prosperity. That is what it means to encourage an}^ in- 

 dustry'; that is what it has meant to the state of Utah to develop our arid 

 farming. 



One of the speakers to-da}' said that it had already been demonstrated, 

 in 1908, and the placard there in front of you says that in 1908 it is already 

 a science. Does that mean we are ready to stop? Does that mean that it 

 is all settled and that we don't need any more state aid? We have state aid 

 in a number of states now. Utah is not the only one. I believe Utah was 

 the pioneer in the work, but the good word and the gospel is spreading 

 and a number of our states have been aiding dry farming. Is the work all 

 done? Are we ready to quit? No. we are just about ready to begin. Dr. 

 Widtsoe and Prof. ^Merrill did not promise if they would give us these 

 farms here that they would demonstrate the entire matter in five years; 

 they said they would demonstrate whether it was a success or a failure in 



