SETTLEMENT AND COLONIZATION IN GREAT LAKES STATES 5 
third of the total area is improved and only about half of the land 
in farms is improved (figs. 2, 3, and 4). 
Table 2 shows for each group of land in farms the percentage im- 
proved, in crops, and in woodland. The difference between the 
three groups is apparently not so much in the degree of improvement 
of the land in farms as it is in the area of land in farms. Thus, - 
nearly a third of what land is in farms in Group I is already im- 
proved, and nearly a fourth is in crops. 
SETTLEMENT BETWEEN 1910 AND 1920 
Table 3 shows that between 1910 and 1920 in the entire region 
under consideration, nearly 314 million acres were added to the 
land in farms, and about 214 million acres to the land in crops. 
LAND IN CROPS 
1913S 
10,000 ACRES 
Fic. 4.—The area of land in crops is somewhat smaller than that of improved land as 
shown in Figure 3, for improved land in.this region includes not only land in crops 
but also brushed pasture, farmsteads, etc. The variations in density of crop land 
correspond closely to variations in density of improved land 
Thus, the increase in crop land, mostly effected by clearing or drain- 
ing, was at the rate of about 250,000 acres a year. This was a decade 
favorable on the whole to expansion of farm area, and it is very 
doubtful if the above average rate of increase has continued during 
the years of the present decade. Even at this rate, and assuming 
that half of the 46 million acres not yet in farms will go into farms 
eventually, it will take 68 years to bring this about. 
More than half the increase in farm area and in improved land 
was in Minnesota. Only 14 per cent of the increase of the land in 
farms was in Michigan, and only 18 per cent of the increase in im- 
proved land in farms. Of the increase in farm land in Michigan, 
nearly half was in the upper peninsula, and likewise about a third of 
the increases of improved land and crop land. 
