Oklahoma Farmer (Guthrie, Okla.), Vol. 15, No. 45, Ed. 1 Wednesday, March 6, 1907 Page: 1 of 16
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TUB ONB DOWN TO DATB FARM PAPER OF OKLAHOMA AIV13 IJVO.
Vol. XV, No. 45.
OKLAHOMA FARMER, WEDNESDAY, MARCH G, 1907.
50 Cents a Year.
1
THEIIl ADVANTAGES AND POSSIBILITIES
Wonderful Increase In Farm Acreage.
Western land has increased in value
during the past seven years at the
greatest rate in history. It is selling
now at higher prices than even in the
other "boom" of the 80s. Not only is
this true in the well-tested farming
lands of the older settled sections of the
Mississippi Valley, but it is as marked
on the "high plains", where depression
in realty values reached unexampled
depths a few yeans ago, says Charles
M. Harger in the Review of Reviews.
Ftor instance: The receiver of a bank-
rupt land and loan company tried in
vain to secure 50 cents an acre for
large tracts of western Kansas land;
now you would be fortunate to get the
same land for less than $10 an acre. Set-
tlers who went West ir> prairie schoon-
ers in the early 80s and left in the middle
90s tried to induce eastern holders of
mortgages to surrender the evidences of
debt in exchange for deeds. Failing, they
packed their goods and departed—to Ok-
lahoma or the Northwest.
Raise in Land Values.
"We could have had possession of '200
farms merely by assuming the mort-
gage eight years ago," said the mana-
ger of a loan company. "Now those
farms are worth $1,000 each above the
mortgages— and they have paid a good
profit every year since the offers were
made."
The economic effect on the Middle west
from this "boom" in land values is at-
tracting attention from the financial
■world. To be sure, the Westerner de-
cries the word "boom". He declares that
it is merely "a healthy growth". But
when the value of a farm doubles in
twenty-four months and is readily sold
on the mraket at the new figure without
any increase in its production and with-
out added improvements it can scarcely
be the more conservative term.
The Government has issued a bulletin
giving some statistics from official
sources for the years 1900-1905, but it
does not tell all the story. Accordtng
to this report the figures for the States
in which the increase of acre value has
been greatest are:
1905 1904.
Kansas $23.99 $15.51
Nebraska 31.73 2'0.00
Missouri 34.70 24.43
Iowa 64.56 49.91
Illinois 75.131 61.83
Oklahoma 10.49 9.90
Minnesota 35.38 28.44
The Western States are given, the
largest increase from an average of
$13.23 to $18.66, though th South Cen-
tral group is a elOft* Moond. Wyoming
leads in the percentage of increase,
showing a gain in farm values of 8.13
per cent in the past five years; Oklahoma
76.7; North Dakota, 70.6; Illinois, 37.4;
Iowa, 29.4; Kansas, 54.7; Nebraska, 54;
Missouri, 42; Oregon, 47; Colorado, 52.
.. Fortunes Made in Farm Speculation.. -
For three years speculation in land
has been one of the West's enthusiastic
devotions. To buy a farm for $3,50.0
and sell it in three months for $5,000 is
as good as Wall street. Yet it has not
been the old timer who has made the
money. He had been through the 90s
and was afraid to venture deeply. The
newcomers—the men who had seen land
values rise in Illinois and Ohio—'bought
the cheap lands and reaped the benefit.
They are the ones who have been gainers
from the boom.
Tho West has learned much about
its possibilities in the past decade, lhe
agricultural colleges, the experiment
farm, the "good seed" trains, and the
results of experience have united to mike
"Vtii
DUTCH BELTED COW -Fair Lily. Property of G. G. Gibbs,
Vail, N. J.
Mi*
> *£>'1 ,
'wM% a
mmk
Barbadoes Sheep recently imported by the Bureau of
Animal Industry
the Western farmer master of his land
to a completer degree than in the old
days of early settlement. He knows
what .crops may be grown, how to
plant these crops, and what varieties to
follow In preserving the fertility of the
soil. Experiment stations are sending
their bulletins free to tens of thousands
of farmers scattered over the plains
region. Some of them are in the well
moistened middle west; some are out
in the "short-grass country", endeavor-
ing to determine the crops that will
grow where less than fifteen inches of
rainfall comes annually. The old-time
settlor tried to farm in Western Nebras-
ka us he did in Illinois—and failed.
Rven out in the dry prairies, where
crop production is out of the ques-
tion, except in tho wet years, may be
seen the settlers' "shacks." To be
sure, there are also the little mounds
o? earth that tell of sod houses built
twenty years ago and deserted—but the
later comers do not expect to raise
crops as is done "back East." They will
make their income from cattle and sheep.
Each year some 400,000 settlers pour
in a stream across the Mississippi
westward. This modern exodus re-
sults naturally and directly from the
full settlement of the older States, and
the desire of the younger generation for
new homes. Tho homeseeker's excur-
sions test the facilities of the railroads;
trains run in four sections as far as the
lower panhandle of Texas, and out into
the "short grass" regions of the Dako-
tas. Travelers avoid excursion days if
possible, so tremendous is the westward
moving throng. This has been the regu-
lar history of every month for three
years; little wonder that land values
leaped forward.
The Prosperous South west.
The southwest has entered on a new
era. It knows—or thlnk« it knows—exact-
ly what crops to raise, and how to cul-
tivate them to secure a permanent in-
come from the farms. It is so confi-
dent of this that it is paying the large
prices for real estate, basing the price
on the income. I^and that will produce
a net return of $10 an acre per year is
reasonably worth $100 per acre. Vast
areas of alfalfa land do that—and more
If it can be done every year, why not
$100 land all through Tile southwest?
Inquiries sent to a hundred bankers
and loan dealers of the Middle west
have brought almost unvarying replies
holding this view. From Missouri comes
reference to a farmer who in 1900 bought
forty acres of land apart from his own
farm. For six years he has kept an ac-
curate account, charging the land with
every day's work, every load of manure
The net income was 14.2 per cent annu-
ally on a valuation of $100. With the im-
proved methods' of agriculture it should
pay as good an income on a valuation of
$150, and "Will then bring that amount.
In jth® sections farther west the bank-
ers say the land is returning a fair in-
come on the high prices, the enormous
wheat crops being responsible.
One county in southwest Kansas sold
over half the county's real estate for
(Continued on page 16 ) 0
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Greer, Frank H. Oklahoma Farmer (Guthrie, Okla.), Vol. 15, No. 45, Ed. 1 Wednesday, March 6, 1907, newspaper, March 6, 1907; Guthrie, Oklahoma. (https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc88143/m1/1/?q=central+place+railroads: accessed July 17, 2024), The Gateway to Oklahoma History, https://gateway.okhistory.org; crediting Oklahoma Historical Society.