iS*/ic RURAL NEW-YORKER 
641 
A Cow-pasture Fortune 
Pumping Gravel on an Ohio Farm 
F ortunes are occasionally found in most un¬ 
expected places, and now and then, beneath 
one’s feet, A\'here we have passed daily for years 
without susi)ecting it. These fortunes are not al¬ 
ways gold, or prized minerals: often the oven)]us, 
;ind seeming waste material in the building of the 
world. Such a find has lately been uncovei-ed in 
the northwest corner of Portage Co., Q., 20 miles 
fi'om Cleveland, laud alongside of the railroad. 
'I'liis has become a cement age, and seemingly 
(‘verything now made of a structural 
kind, is wholly or part cement, but 
all sand and gravel is not equally 
valuable, for it wants a sort of clear 
cut “grit” to bind the cement cora- 
jio\ind, and become an imperishable 
Ihing. 
T'sually the gravel-sand sought is 
found in the blutfs and the small 
hills of the glacial di’ift. but in 
this instance the i)rospector made 
his discovery in the valley. The 
little Chagrin itiver here flows 
along through the pasture and 
meadow lands, a great big spring 
brook most of the year, turning 
here and tlun-e as it winds along the 
valley, and between miniature 
bliifl'.s, and at this particular point, 
the valjey broadens and makes a 
most romantic river pasture of 
.about no acres, with a supposed 
viilue of ]iossibl.v .$.50 an acre l>e- 
cause it was good grass land .and 
well watered, but no one supposed 
for a moment that beneath this 
V,alley was hidden a fortune. It 
Avas not .supi>os{ihle, becau.se tbf^ 
low hills about were made up of 
worlhle.ss Avhite drift sand land. 
One daj' a prospector came to 
look at the sand bluffs. lie saAV 
more than .sand. Would the farmer 
sell his farm? Half of it? Pos¬ 
sibly! It Avould take the little 
jia.sture A-alley? Yes, at $80 an acre. 
An option for 00 days? Then the 
investigators came Avith boring 
tools, and they found that beneath 
the river, covering the entire 50 
acres of i)asture there Avas a bed 
of the linest building graA’el, to a 
(lei*lh of from 300 to 150 feet, inex- 
lijuistible in amount, and a kind 
that .sells instantly in the city at 
$1.75 a ton. Ev'ery one of the.se 
lest Avells revealed inexhaustible 
amounts of the purest Avater. O’lie 
rivtn- sup])lied more,, they Avould 
put in sand-sucker dredges, elevate 
tiu' wjiter and gruA'el to a certain 
height, deliver it into the freight 
cars direct, and avoid all manual 
labor. Then this occurred. Elevmv 
miles aAva.A' there Avas a great elec¬ 
tive jioAver station. Why not run 
high ten.sion power line to the .sand 
immps, and drive all mechanism at 
minimum cost, and haA-e that poaa'- 
er automatic, and put at Avork by 
the turn of a .switch? It Avas some 
work to prepare; dam the little 
river to get a starting pool, grade 
far a railroad track from the main 
line half a mile UAA-ay, and build 
the .sand tOAver; build the poAver 
line 11 mile.s, and put in all appli^ 
ances. Eight mnotlis after, the 
structures looked as depicted in 
the three pictui'es. fl’lie poAver 
beat, Avith its great 14-inch de¬ 
livery centrifugal pump, the great generator and 
40-feet long suction dip dredge, and all conqilete to 
load 80 50-ton cars in 10 hour.s. As seen, tlie boat 
is about 1(X) fcH't long, and 35 broad, built in the 
most .substantial manner. Inside are the great 
imnijis and electric generators. The 14-inch trans¬ 
mission i)i])es are seen buo.ved up by small i)ontoon 
boats. Each length of pipe IS feet long is made 
flexible Avith its neighbor Avith inch thick rubber ' 
collars, made tight Avith clamps and turn buckles. 
• be boat is under its OAvn control and Avorks in 
half circles, and Avith its GO-ft. derrick moves an im- 
iiuvise amount of gravel at each “turn.” The pressure 
of the ])ump .sends the .sand and AAViter uj) the pipe 
"ith great force to the top of the .screen huilding. 
some 0.) teet in height. Here the contents .are poured 
upon a pair of huge rough rollers Avhich reduce 
the .size of the OA-er-large graA'el and small stones 
to ('gg size, and from then doAvn the sieA’es .are 
graded to size so by the time a grist is through, 
the graA’el is graded into tiA’e sizes, and each run 
into its OAvn car. and the SAvitch engine ready to 
l)ut it into its place in the train that in a few 
hours later AA’ill be in CleA'eland, a .system AAiiich 
Avill be made clear by a study of Fig. 252. Fig. 
251 is the great pi])e line trestle from the .shore to 
the top of the toAver. Of course the Avater quickly 
parts company Avitli gi-avel, and tinds its AA’ay back 
men no an the work at the sand mill. I’he freight 
is ,$G00 a day as an average. The sand sells for 
.$1.75 <a ton. There is some breakage, and some de¬ 
lay in the railAA'a.A’ .supplying suflicient car,s. It is 
certainly a paying i)roi)osition. The company is 
a great construction concern u.sing the larger ])art 
of the material in their own building, one item of 
Avhich is the huge, three million-doll.ar concrete 
bi-idge acro.ss the A'alley in f’leveland, Ohio, and 
no end of miles of concrete pavement. The .s.and 
mill is an object of great interest, and the Avonder 
is that the little, back-riA’or coav pasture, has be¬ 
come a mine of Avealth to its OAvners. but it’s no 
r(‘fl(*ction upon its old owner th.at 
he did not discover its v.alue, for it 
has taken a iortune to make a for¬ 
tune pos.sible. .T. o. 
()hio. 
General View of the Ohio Gravel Plant. Fig. 250 
Pipe Line Trestle to Top of Tower. Fig. 251 
Fall, 
in d( 
ling i 
Ave found 
li\-e c 
th.an 
.six 
rods 
tree. 
One 
of ( 
sandy 
soil, 
. and 
Where the Gravel is Crushed and Loaded. Fig. 252 
to the jKiol from Avhenct* it Ciime. tind is possibly 
pumped OA’er .seA’eral times, in Avhole or part. 
It seems incredible tlmt so much material can be 
(‘Uwatt'd to the top of tjie tower and so laipidly. 
One hundred and tift.A’ tons iter hour has been 
loaded, and an average run is something oA'er 100 
tons ])(>r hour; but to think that ovt'r in neighbor 
(’jise’s COAV piisture, Avhere the grass crop av:is po.s- 
sibly .$5 per ;icre per annum. .$2,000 Avorth of sand 
is being taken u]) daily! Certainly it co.st to get 
the mill running, q’he boat alone with its ma¬ 
chinery cost .$,50,000 and .grading, tracks, and the 
l.abor, .$100,000 more, not to mention 11 miles of 
the finest of high voltage transmission poAver line. 
What are the profits? I hardly knoAV I Twelve 
Where Tree Roots Go To 
T he remit rks of .1. Henry 
Rines on itiige .510 call uj) it 
stibject about which there is it great 
dtail Avritten, some of AA'hich is 
bit.sed on ob.serviition. I liaAe noted 
a number of articles in recent 
fiirin papers stating that the roots 
of trees it re usuiill.v of such and such 
a length. Some Imve them extend 
nciirly its far as the branches, .some 
it little farther, AA'hile ;i fcAV Aaai- 
tnresoine ones .say tlmt the roots 
niiiy extend it few feet fiirther thiin 
the briinche.s. It has been my 
fortune (iuul occiisionally mis¬ 
fortune) to note the length of the 
roots of SI number of different 
kinds of trees in the hist 20 years 
or more, and it is my opinion tlmt 
few, if any, trees have roots as 
short n.s the di.stance from the .sur¬ 
face of the ground to the tip of the 
fiirthest branch, measurcsl along 
the trunk and the limbs. Yester- 
<l:iy, in digging out a tree girdled 
by mice, I found a cherry root more 
limn an inch in diameter at a dis- 
t.ince of more tlmn 40 f(H*t from 
the neiirest cherry .stump, and 
iibout a hundred feet from the 
nearest .standing tree. This root 
had groAvn in the two growing .sea¬ 
sons since the trees AA’ere set Last 
some deep ploAving, 
hestnut roots more 
from the nearest 
our nuiAseries is in 
it is not unusual 
to lind roots twice as lung as the 
tree.s, and a quarter of an inch in 
diameter Avhere they break. Un¬ 
less there Avere .some .special rea¬ 
son Avhy the roots could not grow, 
I .should expect to find roots of an 
apple tree 20 feet tall at all points 
Avithin GO feet of the base of the 
tree and. in our soils, to a depth 
of Avell toward 20 feet. 
In the case of tree.s making an 
extra strong root groAvth, such as 
Avlllow.s, cefftonwoods and locust, it 
is likidy Unit the roots of a 
healthy tree of good size Avill pret- 
t.v Avell cover an acre. When Ave 
con.sider that a locust .stumj) Avill 
not only .send up a large number of 
sjtrouts, but that .sju-outs Avill come 
up all along the roots, and that 
these are armed Avith strong 
thorns, it looks less probable that 
the sheep Avould clean them up in 
four year.s. Certainly, the ground 
Avould have to be so heaA’ily pas¬ 
tured for several sea.sons that the sheep Avould get 
every sjirout before it Avas an inch tall. After that 
it might be 50 year.s before the stumps had all 
rotted aAvay, .so that they could be “kicked over 
by the foot.” 
I have before me a book Avritten by a man who 
jirobably in the course of a year teaches the same 
ideas to large classes of students, in Avhich he ghes 
cnsiderahle space to a di.scussion of the Avasteful 
method of planting an orchard in squai'es. He 
shoAvs that 2.3 per cent, of the area is “Avasted.’’ 
but neglects to consider the fact that the roots 
tlioroughly fill this “Avaste” ground, and that the 
tops of the trees in an orchard should never be al- 
loAved to touch. He shows diagrams in Avhich the 
