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ing wheat; I say a man who can grow wheat with favorable and satisfac- 

 tory results, had better stay at the business; it is folly to change a business 

 that is satisfactory and profitable, but there is a large area of land grown 

 to wheat in this State that is not profitable, and the average shows that it 

 must be so. The fact is that our wheat only averages about $8 53 per 

 acre throughout this State, and I do not believe that wheat, on an average, 

 can be produced and marketed for less that $7 50 per acre. I know, in 

 these large ranches with the combined harvesters, it may be produced for 

 much less. President Stickney, of St. Paul, gives the cost of growing wheat 

 in the Northwest at $6 an acre, and the evidence in the case I have referred 

 to, of men of large experience, put the cost of raising wheat at $7 50; so 

 that the best results that we can get of wheat culture, on an average, is a 

 very small profit per acre, and all I say about it is that when you have 

 land, such as there is right around this town, worth $200 per acre, you 

 ought not to keep population out, or keep these great plains sparsely set- 

 tled when it will bring large prices; and if a man don't want to go into the 

 fruit growing business, let him collect his interest, and he will get better 

 results than he would from wheat growing. 



Now about the market: The careful students of to-day cannot but feel 

 a certain degree of concern about the surplus now grown in the United 

 States. The surplus of the whole United States is 27 per cent; of the wheat 

 grown on this coast it is 72 per cent. And we must find a market by ship- 

 ping around the Horn for 72 per cent of our wheat; and if we here could 

 retire some of our wheat land and devote it to something more profit- 

 able, we would help the eastern men who are struggling with wheat and 

 cannot produce apricots, and we would be more independent, and put our- 

 selves in relations to the conditions that surround us; and it seems to me 

 the greatest folly for men to persist in raising wheat where the thermometer 

 is 60 degrees below zero when we have this glorious climate. There is no 

 estimate in money that we can make to compare with our climate, and that 

 is the point I am driving at, and not to drive people out of the wheat cul- 

 ture, for I am thoroughly impressed with the great advantage that we have 

 here in this State by reason of our climate, which we have never given 

 sufficient economic value to, and I want our people's attention centered 

 upon it; I want them to be made alive to the question, that there is some- 

 thing besides wheat growing that we must do; we must take advantage of 

 this great climate that we have which is the source of our great wealth. 

 People are coming in here by thousands to enjoy, not the privilege of grow- 

 ing wheat — they could do that in Dakota — they come to enjoy our glorious 

 climate, and to raise the fruit of the earth which cannot be raised in other 

 regions. 



Mr. Johnston: With the explanation that General Chipman has made 

 in his paper it will be entirely satisfactory to me. It is not that I object 

 to the statement of the profitableness of raising fruit on lands that were 

 adapted to fruit, but it was as to lands, of which we have hundreds of 

 thousands of acres, that are not well adapted to fruit; and I want to say 

 here, Mr. President, that we are noted in the Eastern States largely on 

 account of the wheat products of California. Within a very few years we 

 were more noted for wheat than we were for fruit, and ten years ago there 

 would be more questions asked by a person who desired to come to the 

 Pacific Coast about wheat than about fruit. Latterly the fruit question 

 has absorbed all the curiosity nearly of those who desire to come to Cali- 

 fornia, and has left the wheat question to one side. The figures that the 

 gentleman gives as far as Dakota is concerned, are not applicable to our 

 farms in California, neither are the figures of Mr. Cone and the other gen- 



