687 / D2 D2 \^ opy 1 \ / GG3S~'7^\\r ..The [.and of Milk and j4oney." ^-^Wt □ KANSAS AND ITS County of Davis. Information for People Seeking Homes in the West. Publislied by the Davis County, Kansas, Bureau of Immigration. ^. JUNCTIOX CITY, KANSAS: ^ a ->Jhe [^and of Milk and Honey. KANSAS AND ITS County of Davis. Information for People Seeking Homes in the West. Publisl^ed by the Davis County, Kansas, Bureau of Iiximigration. JUNCTION CITY, KANSAvS: PRINTED AT TilE OFFICE OF THE JUNCTION CITY ¥NIOX. 187S. Officers" § Davis Conoty Bnrean of Immigration. B. ROCKWELL, President Junction City JOHN GROSS, Vice President, Junction City JOHN DAVIS, J. S. CORYELL, E. BIGGS, E. R. F. MORGAN H. A. MILLER, " Smoky HbU Township '• Lyoji To-jonship " Jackson TovjnsJiip. " Liberty Tov:nship " Milford Township P. V. TRO VINGER, Recording Secretary, Junction City J. J. BLATTNER, Treasurer, A. C. PIERCE, Corresponding Secretary, '' " Executive Committee, JAMES KETNER, W. S. BLAKELY, MARTIN MULLINS, S. S. PROUTY, JOHN K. WRIGHT, B. ROCKWELL, A. C. PIERCE, MAP OF KANSAS. On the preceding page will be found a map of Kansas, which gives a correct idea of the location and boundaries of its counties and a fair representation of the streams. The railroads as indicated on the map, are all completed, and at least two hundred more miles have been construct- ed since the map was made. The western terminus of the Central Branch road is now at Concordia, instead of Waterville, as shown by the map, and the Junction City & Ft. Kearney road now intersects the Central Branch road at Chfton, in the southwest corner of Washington county. .- (Clifton is a new town and does not appear on the map. The terminus of this road, as there indicated, is at Clay Center, but it has lately been extended to Clifton). Junction City, the county seat of Davis county, is the initial point of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas railway, which is in operation to Galveston, on the Gulf of Mexico, and is also in operation to the Mississippi river at Hannibal, Mo. Junction City as also on the line of the Kansas Pacific railway, being a central point on the great international railway between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. It is the only city in Kansas, on the Kansas Pacific railway, that enjoys the benefits of railway competition with the East. Hence Junction City is the best grain market in Central Kansas. The Junction City & Ft. Kearney railway, now completed to CHfton, a distance of fifty miles, commences at Junction City. It will eventually be extended to Fort Kearney, Nebraska, a point on the Union Pacific railway. What is regarded as the "plains" county, formerly known as the " Great American Desert," hes west of Saline county. Davis county is the heart of the grain growing resrion.. KANSAS. The area of Kansas is 81,31s square miles. Only five states have a larger area than Kansas. Kansas has more square miles than Ohio, Indiana, Delaware and Connecticut combined. England and Scotland together contain 89,60x3 square miles, or 8,282 more than Kansas. Its population now is estimated to be 800,000, but the state is capable of containing a population of 10,000,000. Kansas is an empire ; a giant still in its cradle. It was organized in a territory in 1854 and admitted into the Union as a state in 1861. Previous to 1854. it was the home of the Indian and the buffalo ; to-day it is one of the most promising stars of the federal constellation. Let us see Kansas as it is to-day : Kansas will stand heavier rains and more prolonged drouth than any countr}- between the great lakes and the mountains. A great change has come over this country in the matter of rainfall, in the last twenty years. No state in the Union has now any more abundant or regular rainfall than Kansas. It was unquestionably subject to prolonged and excessive drouths until a comparatively recent time. But the climatic change which the whole country has undergone, with the breaking up of the prairie, the planting of crops, the growth of artificial forests, orchards and hedges, the building of railways, telegraph lines and towns and the rapid spread of the native forests since the annual prairie fires were checked, have produced the necessary atmospheric disturbance to generate moisture, till the country has ample rainfall for all the domestic uses. The rainfall has drifted westward with the march of settlement and husbandry until the copious rains of the latter years are as proverbial as the drouths of the old time. The climate is charniing. The brief winter brings little snow^ and the live stock run in the wooded bottoms through the coldest weather. Spring and Autumn are something to be remembered here. The one comes in with the song of the birds and the opening of the flowers and grasses as regularly as the years come and go. The other is a prolonged Indian summer running away to the holiday scarson. These seasons are well defined as grand divisions of the year. They are never in doubt but come wath the regularity of the tides. In the later years they have been so exceptional and uncertain in the old States that they are only subject of hope, and never enter into careful calculation. 6 The topographical features of Kansas are quite as much an attraction as the cHmate. No country west of the great lakes exceeds it for the beauty and sweetness of its pastoral landscapes. The great prairies are never monotonous here for they are almost infinite in the variety of their attractions. The peaceful, winding valley, with its accompanying v/ater course and timber Kne is a happy offset to the open grassy plain and rolling prairie, and is nearly always set in pleasing contrast with the table land, bluff or mound. Now and then owe sees a great range of hills running along the horizon for a score of miles. The mound is nearly always in sight and varies in form and size from the lone cone- shaped elevation of lo to 200 acres up the grand mesa or tal)le-mound v*'ith its extended plain, sufficient for three, six or a dozen farms. These mounds are found all the way from the Rio (irande northward to Nebraska and from the Missouri westard to the Snowy Range. They are more positive features of the southwestern landscape and from the distance, the atmospheric influence that surrounds them, lends an indefinable charm that is never forgotten. Nobody can adequately describe the beauty of these Kansas views for they are inimitable and matchless. From March to December they are clothed with verdure and decked with flowers. There are no waste places in all this realm of ^ native grasses and bloom. A hundred varieties of wild grasses find sustenance from the water lines to the crown of the highest hills. Wild flowers, in endless variety, keep them company. The soil is rich — rich ^ as a garden all along this Kansas valley — and produces generously. Vs Only half the care necessary to successful husbandry in the old States, v is required here. The soil is managed under the happiest conditions. It is rarely too wet or too dry. The season of growth is long and friendly. The foul, noxious weeds and plants of the East are hardly known here. Less labor is required in cultivation and so the cultivator who first plows and plants too much, afterwards get careless, is content to do half and leave the other half to generous Mother Nature. Food is cheaper and more plentiful, and the climate milder than in the old country from which the pioneer comes. He can get on with less money, for his wants are fewer. He can get on with less labor and hurry because the soil is richer and the season of growth longer. He don't need the warm expensive shelter of his eastern neighbor because he never feels the rigors of eastern or northern winter. There is less stimulus to labor on account of local necessity and so farming loses thoroughness and discipline. There are thousands of men living in this delightful State, with half the effort they used to bestow at the East. They are living just as well and generally better. But the man of progressive thought and vigorous action ; the earnest, driving, wide-awake mim is everywhere growing rich. Why shouldn't he "i The soil is deep, rich and enduring. The climate as genial as that of Virginia. He can cultivate — and do it thoroughly — twice as much corn or wheat as the Michigan or Illinois farmer. If the acreage is greater, so too is the average yield. The wheat farmers grow iS to 40 bushels per acre. The corn men 35 to 70 bushels per acre. These figures are often exceeded. Then comes. the advantage of variety farming. No country in the world is more abundant in native and varied agricultural resources. Wheat, corn, oats, rye, barley, fiax, castor beans, sweet potatoes, Irish potatoes, the whole family of field and garden vegetables, buckwheat. millet, Hungarian, sorghum, tobacco, hemp, and broom corn are at home in Kansas. Any one of them may be made a success in culture and revenue. The man who raises most oi' them and gives thorough culture is sure to get independent. Mixed farming beat the specialties "two to one." Allied to these sources of local strength are the grasses. The wild grasses are everywhere numerous, nutritious and luxuriant. There are no resources like them. They ieed the beef that feeds the million. The beef-eaters are the world's masters. They stand in the front rank and lead the march of human progress. So rich and alnmdant are these native grasses, that few farmers give any thought ov labor to domestic varieties. Blue grass, clover, timothy, orchard gras?- and white clover all flourish here, but for a dozen years to come the wiki grass and hay will be the dominant resource of the country. No g^-ass in the world will put so much flesh upon cattle, horses and mules> from March to August, as the wild pasturage of this country. Ifc cost? i::othing to graze it and but a dollar a ton to make it into hay. It is the property of the poor and rich alike. Millions of acres of unoccupied land furnish the richest grazing fields on the continent. Stock raising leads all the other interests of this country. Corn, cattle and hogs make any country rich. They lead all other agricultin-al interests in money-making. Where these can be most easily and cheaply produced is the best country. North Texas, Kansas, Iowa. Southern Nebraska, Illinois and Missouri are the corn gracing fields that make the beef and pork for the continent. The business pays in. Kansas because of the cheapness of the lands, the richness of the grasses-- and the mildness ol the climxite. It is the hog and cattle man's paradise. Where they raise corn with half an etlbrt, and the great God has made an empire of the sweetest grasses, ^/lerc is the herdsman's kino-dom. Kansas is the geographical and climatic centre of that kingdom. In Illinois and Eastern Iowa the lands range from $-^0 to $70 per acre, and it costs money to raise cattle. Artificial shelter must be provided at -'arge expense, for winter shelter. Here the lands range from -$1.2:; to ^S per acre, and not one herd in fifty ever gets more than the natural shelter of the timber in the bottoms. It costs 25 to 40 cents per bushel to grow corn in the older states. Here it is grown at a cost of 13 to i5 cents. No country is bettered watered than this. It is a land of valleys. Every valley is coursed by a sj^ring, brook, creek or river. The Eastern people misapprehend Kansas. They have not seen this country and have heard of it mainly through its early misfortunes. They shoidd see the herds, corn cribs, grain fields and orchards. vSee these green waving seas of prairie, radiant with the morning dews and breathe the rare atmosphere, fragrant with the breath of a million wild flowers. They should ride all day in a copious flow of rain water to correct their false impressions of ''drouthy Kansas." The dear people who believe that Kansas is a land of grasshopper and drouth sliould come and talk with the grangers who raised 130,000,000 bushels of corn last year, 90.000,000 the year before, ?.nd Who have acreage and beautiful promise for 150,- 000,000 bushels the present year. Kansas will export 20,000,000 bu.shels of red winter wheat of this year's crop, besides sowing a larsrer area than ever before and feeding her own people. And her fruits, who can estimate them ? Whole cargoes of peaches will go to the well bred hogs for v/ant of home market or near transportation. The peach orchards arc bending under the weight of noble fruits ah-eady blushing with ripening. They are the glory and luxury of the State. Everybody (nearly) has a vineyard, and it bears generous burdens. The grape is perfect here. The west winds drive away the mildew and the softer south wind gives color and llavor. Kansas is becoming a land of vintages. Apples, cherries, pears and smaller fruits never did better in Maryland or Michigan than along these valleys and up on the blue mounds. The good Lord — and the birds — have sent the grasshoppers to "kingdom come." and the kingdom of the Jawhawkers is in its glory. Two years of generous crops, and the fullness of promise for the present year has brought Kansas to the front and given genuine j[?rospcrity to every department of life. The traders are doing well and w«re never on a sounder basis. The farmers are fast becoming independent: hundreds of them who came here poor are now opulent. They have seen hard times, but that day is over. Thev sit in the shadow of the trees which their own hands have planted. They cat ■ and drink oif their own fig-tree and vine. Every race of pioneers has a hard tight to overcome the drawbacks of the frontier and propitate the blessed boon of honorable existence. The men of Kansas have fought ■ their light. They say that "every dog has his day.'" The saying is one • of a thousand Yankee vulgarisms, but the idea it embodies is a part of • die philosophy of life. Kansas is in the bright dawn of her prosperous '"'lay. No country has such jDower of re-bound, as the mechanics say. Only ycslcl'day she was asking alms for her suffering children. Last (Evening she clothed herself in robes of purple, and green, and gold, and stood in the gas-light at the assembly of nations in Philadelphia. Ceres and Fomona kept her company. Child of misfortune, whom the world had learned to pit}', they come to admire her now, for she is fairer than Narcissus. Princes and nobles walk in her court of beauty and wonder at her material splendor. Her own children reared the charming temple where she holds court and decked its halls with the fairest olierings of field and forest, of garden and orchard. No wonder she is admired, for she represents alike the beauty of youth and strength. A quarter of a century ago she was born of old Mr. Morse's mvthical "American Desert." She is young in years but rich ir. experience and wisdom. She has wept herself, like Niobe, almost to hardness for the loss of her best and bravest children, but she is self- helpful and strong and fair to-day. They bandied rude epithets to express their contempt of her in the years of doubt and trial, and now. in the dawn of her prosperous day, fortune brings favor and friends. "Nothing is so successful as success." Kansas stands in the fore- ground and is recognized and honored by virtue of what she has wrought under discouragement. She is in her glory now ; the shadows have passed, the sun shines, and prosperity and fullness flows with steady increasing tide. No country is more prosperous to day than Kansas. They have more wealth at the East, but it is locked up in depressed realty and fitful stocks. Trade, production, values, everything has touched the maximum and are in the shrinking process. Here the tendenc}- is upward. The country is young and growing. Trade is steadily expanding. Production is constantly increasing. Wealth is rapidly but healthfully accumulating with the development of local resource. Kansas offers more to the emigrant to-day, than any land 9 between the two oceans. The climate is charming. The soil is for the most part unexcelled. The variety and possibilities of production are wonderful. The schools are among the best ; society is good and growing better. The country is healthful and more beautiful than car. be described. There is wood, coal, stone, timber water and fruits, all of good quality and abundant. 10 DAVIS COUNTY. A HE A AND POl'UJ-ATIOX. Davis county comprises 407 square miles of territory with a population of about 5,000 people. vSome t,c;oo of the.se people were 1 iTii^qmr^ M.K.&T.KR.Laiids Government Xands LJ liaii.PacJ?;IR.l;anaB ^ 11 born in the State of Kansas. Others are from States and countries as follows: Illinois 418, Missouri 366, Ohio 1269, Indiana 202, Iowa 196, Pennsylvania 193, Wisconsin 105, Michigan 104, England and Wales I So, Sweden, Norway and Denmark 179, Germany 133, and from other places, smaller numbers. Besides this enumeration, there is a transient population at Fort Riley, a government military post located in the county, which has a capacity for six companies of cavalry. This post adds considerably to the trade and importance of the vicinity. ALTITUDE AND TOPOGRAP]lY. The average altitude of the county is nearly 1,300 feet above the sea level. The face of the country is diversified with valleys and uplands. Near the rivers and streams, there are limestone blufls, but aside from these, the county consists of alluvial valleys, and broad, rich prairies, more or less rolling, and generally well drained. soil. AND WATER. The soil is usually a clay loam of great depth and richness. In the valleys, there is an admixture of sand, forming a deep, black, sandy loam of inexhaustible fertility. The county is abundantly watered by the Republican, Smoky Hill and Kansas rivers, with numerous tributaries that are fed by perennial springs. In the language of stock raisers, Davis county may be truly descril:)ed as ''well watered." Springs flow freely from the sides of blulis in such force that the streams fed by them are never entirely closed by the coldest weather, and are never seriously alfected by the severest droughts. The water is pure, clear and cold, like that common in Kentucky and other limestone countries. Besides the streams and springs, it is not difficult to obtain the purest v/ater by digging or boring wells. The depth of wells varies greatly, from fifteen to one liundred feet. Forty or fifty feet is not an uncommon dejith on the level prairies. WATER POWER. Besides water for men and animals, Davis county has an immense amount of available v/ater power, for mill and manufacturing purposes — more, perhaps, than any territory of equal size v/est of the Alleghany mountains. Our rivers are large enough to supply the greatest abundance of water at the lowest stages, while they are not so large as to require exorbitant outlays to utilize their forces, l^elow the jundtion of the Republican and Smoky Hill, the difKculty of too large a volume of water begins, and it increases continually as we pass eastward, by the accession of the Blue and other tributaries. At Topeka or Lawrence, it will require ten times the capital to construdi and maintain a permanent dam than it does at Junclion City or above here, on either of the rivers which unite to form the Kansas; while, at the same time, our rivers never lack for water. This is an important point for capitalists to consider before locating and investing for mill purposes. We challenge a comparison of the cost and practical workings of the mills and factories on the Smoky Hill, at and above Jundion City, with those on the Kansas below here. Nor need any one fear that this point is too far west for profitable invest- ments. This county is in the very midst of the agricultural region, of 12 cheap food and good markets for goods, implements, and other manufactured producls. It is closely connected with the great cotton fields of Texas, and with the water on the Gulf, as any point east of here. And, it may be further stated, that capitalists have already recognized and acted upon these fafts, and tiiat there are, at present, more mills and machinery now in operation on the Smoky Hill than there are on the Kansas. PERMANENCE OF STREAMS. The most remarkable fact to an eastern observer is the permanence of the streams on the great Kansas prairies. Although they do not rise in the mountains, and are not direi!:tly fed b\' the great mountain snow fields, yet it is evident that they are indirectly so fed. But a small portion of the waters of those broad mountain regions, with fifty feet depth of melting snows, is able to escape in the form of mountain torrents. The pent-up reservoirs pass into the bowels of the earth, and, per force of hydrostatic pressui'e, find vent as gushing springs all through the outlying foot hills and plains, for hundreds of miles. These springs are plentiful in Kansas. They are plentiful in this county. They are numerous about the sources of our rivers. They are the origin and life of these rivers. They obtain their supplies from the vast snow fields of the broadest chain of mountains in the world, and are not afiected by the severest droughts. There is, in the driest time, more than one hundred horse i:)Ower of surplus water passing over the dam of the Star Mills, on the Smoky Hill river at Junction City. There is another fa6t, not generally recognized. Our rivers, and especially the Smoky Hill, are not only very permanent, but they are also very regular, during the extremes of rain and drought. Usually, the channels are deep, and, besides the channels proper, there are broad bottom lands, both above and below high water mark. These broad alluvial valleys are underlaid with a porous subsoil which is readily permeated bj- the waters of the rivers. During rainy seasons, which should seemingly cause great floods in the rivers, the water escapes into the subsoil, to a great distance from the channels, and, by thus underjto-wing the vallej's, their overflow is prevented. Then, as the dry weather sets in, this subsoil, saturated with water, feeds the rivers, and preserves a regular stage of water. These fads have been verified by the rise and fall of wells in the vicinity of the streams, during rains and droughts, and by the permanent rise of wells after the construction of mill-dams. This'permeable subsoil, then, may be reckoned as a great hydrostatic balance wheel, regulating very materially the eftects that droughts and rains produce on our Kansas rivers. They are, therefore, much more equable and permanent than the}- could possibly be were they fed direCtly by the mountain torrents, or had no means of storing away the floods of hea^-en as they are so copiously but irregularly poured out. No State or country can surpass Central Kansas in the permanence and regularity of its rivers for motive power purposes. The New York Tribune says: — "More and steadier water poWer is quietly running to waste in Kansas than in any other State in the Union. Were this to be said of Idaho or Montana, it would meet with prompt and unhesitating credence; but that strong and unfailing streams should be found in Kansas, where there are neither mountains nor extensive forests, where there arc no heavy snows; and where all the rivers have their sources, either at the foot hills of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, or on our undulating prairies, is really remarkable. The annual rainfall in Kansas is fully up to the average of the Atlantic States. "The largest streams, such as the Kansas, Neosho, Republican, Solomon, Smoky HiU, Saline, and many other considerable streams, l1ow in deep channels through vast deposits of sandy alluvium, often several miles wide. So deep are these channels that the streams rarely overflow their banks. During the rainy seasons these deposits are charged with aU the water they can absorb. They are reservoirs of immeasurable capacity which ai'e slowly and steadily discharged by percolation, and the streams sink lower and lower in their channels, and thus maintaining their flow through the warmer months of the year. "Kansas can be made one of the foremost manufacturing States. Not one west of Massachusetts equals it in permanent and valuable water-powers, and in addition to its water-power it has a soil of unsurpassing fertility, a salubrious climate, and railroads stretching out in all dire<5tions.'" BUILDING STONE. One of the strong points of Davis county is its inexhaustible quarries of beautiful building stone. It is white, or cream-colored magnesian limestone, soft and easily worked when first quarried, but gradually becoming harder when exposed to the air. It is used for every purpose — for paving the streets, building mill-dams, making fences, arid for the construction of the finest and most permanent buildings. The stone for the State House at Topeka was quarried in Davis county. Large quantities of this beautiful, easily-worked material have been shipped to Kansas City, St. Louis and Chicago. Some of the more orna- mental parts of the fine State House of Illinois, at Springfield, are made of Davis county stone. It crops out along the brows of all the bluff's, and is handled down hill from the quarries to the wagons or railroad trains. In most countries, stone is quarried in the depths of the earth, and is raised and removed at great expense and with much labor. Here, men quarry stone, literally, up in the air, and its removal from the quarries is a mere matter of gravity, which is easily and cheaply performed. The supply of this valuable article is absolutely inexhaustible,, and is yet to become a perpetual mine of wealth to the county. * timbp:k. Native timber in Kansas should only be used for fuel and other incidental purposes. It should never be wasted for fences. Stone, herd laws, and live hedges must protec5t our crops and confine our animals. Under such an arrangement, our supply of wood is suffi- cient for the present, and. when protected from prairie fires, the quantity is continually increasii.g. It consists of oak, ash, black walnut, Cottonwood, elm, hickory and the usual varieties of hard woods found further east. There arc no evergreens growing wild except the red cedar. Timber growing will be a profitable part of the business of our prairie farmers, for decorative and shelter purposes. These varities now growing in our woods will generally succeed best. 14 GRASSES. The wild glasses of Kansas are similar to those of Illinois and other prairie States. The upland grasses have a fine blade and usuall}' grow to the height of one or two ieet. The central seed stem is much taller. The coarse bottom grass is from four to six or eight feet high. There is an intermediate grass called the blue stem, usually found on the drier bottoms and less elevated highlands. It is a rank, free-growino- grass, with a sweet, soft, pithy stem which is very nutritious. It bears a rich crop of seed, and when protected from animals during the summer, is of great value as pasturage in the winter. It is the best wild grass for hay, though all varieties are used for that purpose. Millet and Hungarian are much raised for hay, and are exceedingly valuable. The Kentucky blue grass will prove a good pasture grass though rather scarce as yet in this county. Alfalfa, or Chilian clover, recently introduc- ed from California, promises to be a valuable acquisition both for hay and pasture. ' CULTIVATED CROPS. Wheat is the crop mostly relied on for early cash returns. The winter varieties are much the more profitable. Corn is usually a good crop, but it pays the stock raiser for feeding purposes, better than the grain raiser for direct sale. Oats and barley are good crops on strong lands. Rye has never been known to fail, and is a good crop for pasturage and for grain purposes, when the price rules high enough to pay for ship- ment. Millet and Hungarian are among the most profitable crops for feeding purposes. Sorghum, buckwheat, flax, castor beans, broom, corn, Irish potatoes, and all the field and garden crops grown in this latitude, usually succeed in this county. Sweet potatoes do especially well in our rich, valiey soils, and some of our experienced growers have preserved the potatoes through one summer and two Vk^inters. CULTIVATED TREES, The varieties ot trees growing wild in the woods of Kansas will generally succeed well when subjected to cultivation. The variety considered most valuable for quick growth is the Cottonwood. But for timber purposes and for purposes of embel- lishment, there are many trees much more valuable. Among these may be mentioned the black walnut, ash, elm, and box elder. These trees are comparatively quick 'of growth, and the timber is valuable. The soft maple stands high as an ornamental and timber tree, but must be grown on bottom lands to insure success. FRUITS AND FRUIT TREES. Those fruit trees, vines and plants that succeed farther east in latitudes 38° or 39° may be relied on as promising success here, under favorable circumstances of location and culture. Kansas has astonished the world, sometimes, in the production of apples and fruits of that class ; yet it may be said that our climate is especially a peach or grape climate. We have a bright, warm sun and a dry atmosphere, just the thing for sun- loving trees and plants as are most at home in the northeastern States, or in England. We have raised, with success, in Davis county, apples, pears, peaches, plums, cJierries. grapes, blackberries, raspberries, currants, gooseberries. 15 and strawberries. Successful production has gencrallv been in propor- tion to care and skill in mana;;enient. The plum, grape, gooseberry, raspberry, strawberry, &c., &c., are found wild here. There are nurseries in the county where every desirable tree, vine, and plant can be obtained on good terms, and in ample quantities. The osage orange is much used for iiedging, and is a complete success for that purpose. IKUrr GKOWIXG. Young as our State i.>, she some years ago at the National Fruit Congress at Philadelphia, carried away the highest awards, for the superior products of our orchards, and again at the Centennial Exposi- tion, our fruits were the wonder ;ind admiration of that vast assembly, and vicinity Although the tracks of the buffalo were hardly obliterated, Kansas furnished its full share to both those exhibitions. "And we are proud to say it compared favorably with the best. And our hearts a/e agaiu gladdened with the prospect of an abundant crop the present year. Our apple, pear, peach, plum, cherry, apricot, nectarine, and in fact all fruit trees of sufficient age are loaded to their utmost capacity. The summer of 1S74 will long be remembered as the only year that fruit trees were ever injured by drouth or grasshoppers. Trees grow faster and bear younger than in any State cast of us. The fact is now pretty well established, that a ten year old apple tree is worth more than a cow. And it is equally as well understood that we car raise and care for an orchard of 100 or a 1,000 trees to that age much easier than we can a herd of cattte of that same number. Small fruits of all sorts have been a complete success, with the exception of one fatal year. Our location being the nearest possible source from which Colorado and its vast mining population can be supplied, renders it one of the most favorable on the continent for extensive orchard culture. And the certainty of this inexhaustible and never-ending market, will insure us remunerative prices for all we can possibly grow. Forest and shade trees grow as fast here as anvwhere in America. Shrubbery of all sorts does finel}', and several sorts of evergreens are at home in our soil. Trees of all sorts are cheap, and we have r-irsery- men here who can supply }'ou with anything you want from a fo:-est to a flower garden. STOCK RAISING, CLIMATE, ETC. No countrv in the latitude of Davis county can surpass it for stock raising purposes. Her beautiful prairie swells and ridges are always clothed in summer, with coating of the most nutritious grasses, and not a Hy nor an insect is found to seriously disturb the quiet of animals Although a new country, the hated "greenhead,.' so prevalent and savage in Illinois is never seen. Even gnats and mosquitoes are con- fined to the lower valleys, so that cattle and horses ranging on the high prairies, all summer long have nothing to do except to grow and get fat. Long tails, which are so necessary to the comfort of animals \\\ regions along the Ohio, Wabash and JMississippi, are, on the rolling prairies of Davis county, more ornamental than useful. The valleys furnish a rank growth of coarser grasses than the uplands, and should be treated as a "late burn," and persistently pastured all summer to keep the grass tender. Shade and shelter from sun in summer and 16 storms in winter are found in the deejD woodod ravines, that abound in many parts of the county. Davis county if; marked by nature as the proper home of catUe, horses, and sheep. The valley farmer, with his broad, rich sections, should raise cattle. Such a iarm, on the margins of our rivers, is the paradise of shorthorns. The upland farmer, on the level prairies, may choose his animals, as all will do equally well in such a locality, while the owner of bluffs, quarries, and ravines can beat the v/orld on sheep, and may raise horses, mules, or the smaller breed of cattle. Swine do well in Kansas, but should generally be kept as incidental to other farming. The stupendous pork history of Ohio and: Illinois can not be profitably repeated in this county. The winters in this part of Kansas are usually not severe. The long, soaking, winter rains and deep snows of the States further east and north are seldom witnessed here. Compared with these, the winters here are dry and mild. To properly underf,tand the climate of this part of Kansas, it must be remembered that we get our moisture from two sources, the east and the west. The supply from eastern directions comes from the Atlantic, the gulf, the lakes, and the evaporation along the Mississippi river and its tributaries. This supply may be said to be constant, and rains depending upon it may be expected at any or all seasons, with little regularity and much uncertainty. As we recede v/estward, the supply of rain from eastern sources becomes continually smaller, until we should finally reach a rainless desert, were it not for other causes. The western supply of moisture comes from the vast snow fields of the Rocky mountains. This cause is active only during season that the snows are melting — say from ]\f ay to July, when the snows arc not deep, but continuing later in proportion to the supply of snow. In. accordance with these facts, Kansas has most rain in the growing season ; that is, the season of melting snows in the Rocky mountains. In the cold months, when the snows are not melting in the mountains, Kansas has rain and moisture, only from easterly directions, and the amount is much less than in regions further east. By this rule, also, the summers of Kansas must prove dry, after June, when the dry supply of mountain snows falls short, and is early melted. While, if there are deep snows in the mountains, west and southwest of us, there will be plenty of rain all summer. The western supply of moisture saves western Kansas from j:)roving a desert, and enables us to predict the character of our summers v/jthsome certainty, at the opening of spring. In thus explaining the general facts that Kansas has fruitful summers and dry mild winters, we think we have demonstrated its climatic adaptability of raising stock. Nor do wc, in thus showing the adapta- bility of this region to stock raising, detract one wliit from its advantages for grain raising and for manufacturing purposes. FAKMINC WITHOUT FENCTNG. ^ Vv''e have a law in Kansas, which has been sustained by the Supreme Court, which enables county commissioners, upon a certain petition or vote of the people, to issue an order restraining from running at large, in their respective counties. It is called the herd law, and is designed to enable farmers to raise crops without the expense of fencing. It is the most remarkably successful reform of this decade. There is, imder this law, no trespass by stock, because stock :s better cared for by its owners. There is less litigation about trespass than in a lence country, because fences are always reliable. The idea of the herd law is the embodiment of justice and common sense. It protects the growing crops, which distuib no one, from the roaming-, malicious steer, which i^ a constant disturbance to everybody. In other words, it requires every man to take care of his own property, and to restrain it from disturbing- others. It improves the stock, decreases litig-ation, develops the c and the superioritv of its educational svstem over that of any sister state in tiic west. WHAT HAS BKKV DON'!::. "The proof of the pudding is in the eating thereof." Does it pay to raise wheat in Davis county ? Let the following facts answer : In 1S75 Hon. John K. Wright raised on his farm, one mile from Junc- tion Cit-v-. 1.400 bushels of fall wheat, from So acres, which he sold for $1.00 per bushel. In 1S76 he raised 2,000 bushels of fall wheat on no acres, which he sold for So cents per bushel. In 1S77 Ue raised on 75 acres 1,300 bushels," for which he received 97^cents per bushel. William E. Taylor, livino^ one and a half mile west of Junction City, last year threshed 3,350 bushels of wheat from 100 acres, and sold the most of it at $1,10 per bushel. The following table shows tlie experience in wheat raising of jNIr. McNamee, a farmer living seven miles west of Junction : 1872 30 acres : average 18 bushels. 1873 .-. 50 acres average 20 bushels. 1S74 90 acres average J3 bushels. 1875 100 acres average zo bushel>. 187!) 200 acres average 18 bushels. Mr. McNamee has three hundred acres of fall wheat this year. W. S. Rulisou makes the following exhibit. His farm is ten miles west of Junction City. U.is work was all done by contract, not a dollar having been invested in machinery. It is an interesting and valuable statement, showing the c>:pense of raising a crop of wheat from virgi;i soil : IS nu, FJrci^rvin;;- ^_:^5 :ier-Gb at ^z.^o <1< 5S7 50 llarrowitij^ twice at 20c per icre each 94 00 So\vin;4 with seeder at 2gc each 4.7 co M^^ tnisliels seeds at So cents i88 00 ilivvestin^-, stacking-, etc., at $2.10 per acre 470 00 Threshinj2: -50 00 Dclivcrin;; to market 175 00 Interest on lan cents 3-3-5 '^<^' The follawiny is llic experience of John S. Corvell : Lvon's (Jxkf.k, April 25, 1878. Mv iirst farming in Kansas was in 1873, I broke raw prairie and put in twelve acres in fall wheat. It yielded forty-one bushels per acre. In the year 1873 ^ broke more prairie, and stubbled in the twelve acres, making in all 38 acres that averaged 37 bushels per acre. In the fall of 1S74 i put in on stubble and new ground 30 acres, that averaged 38 bushels per acre. In the fall of 187^ I put in on stubbie and new breaking 47 acres that averaged 3:; bushels per acre. In the fall of 1876 I put in about 90 acres, and tfnc grasshoppers ate that all up, then in the latter part of October, I resowcd about 53 acres, and that averaged about i\ bushels per acre. Aly spring wheat (The Odessa) averaged 3^ bushels ))er acre. Idun vS. C\!kvej,i.. I'ltlCKS IN DAVIS COL'XTV. Eastern people who contemplate removing to Kansas naturally wisii to know whether it will pay to bring along their household gootl-.. farming in>plements, stock, etc. For their- benelit prices at Junction City, ot a few of the leading articles they are compelled to have ar? given below : Cook .Stoves, tor either coal or wood, fron\ -$16 to 3^ ; Heating Stove-s, from .$16 to 35; Milk Pans, (6 cpiart) zoc(ff' z^c.', Milk I'ail.-i, 5oc(<' 75c.; Dish Pans, 40c (« 75c.; Farm Wagons, 70 C^" $75.; Spring Wagons, $ 1 30 (a 135 ; Reapers aid Mowers (combined) $150 ; Culti- vators, -3-50 0': .$35 ; Sidky Plows, -$50 (a'' (mj ; Bedsteads, $3.50 to 34 ; Hureaus, 13 to .$50, Chairs, Kitcheii from 4 to $6 per half do/.en; IJreak- Ikst Tables, good walnut, $4 ; Harness, (Plow double) 8 (if: $10 ; Harness, (Work) 3o to .$40; Prints, 6c (ff' Sc; Muslins (l)rown) 6c (rf izJ.c: Muslins, (bleached) Sc (a' I3.^c.; (Jinghams, loc ('f 1 34c.; Cheviots, loc ('?) i8c.: Cottonades, 15c (n 30c.; Cotton, Flannels, loc (('"' 30c.; Crash, icx^if' 30C.; Denims, 15c (a 3oc.; Jeans, 30C («' 75c.; Men's Kij) Shoes," $1.3; to 3.50 : Men's Kip FJoots, $3.50 to 4.00 ; Women's Heavy Shoe.-. $i.oo to 3.50: Women's Fine Shoes, $1.35 to $5.00 ; Cow.s, ,|3s to 30; Work (,)xen. |6o to 100 per yoke ; Dratt Horses, $75 to roo ; Muics: $75 to 135. wit.xr rr costs to <;kt njcu)'.. Having given the cost here of a few of the leading necessary articles foF housekeeping and farming, the ncKt thing in. order will be tell wh;*r it costs to get here. The following tables will give thi.s informati(^n : -n 55 -4 55 " 7 <-^^ J 7 o^ ^ T o^ -7 '->^ -7 ^\5 -'/ oo ^)'i:riAJ. KAii;s loi? c oi.dMsis ou k:m u;ka.\j>~ \ ia missoiim. kaxsas .\\l> ICXAS iJAIJAVA^. JliiunilKi! to Junction City...':^!! o;;. liannilml to ). Cilv nwd vc'i -tio o<) (.^iiincy to junction City ii -^o. C^uincy to j. Citv and re't... . _'i oo St. Louis to junction City. . i .; (xj, St. I^ouis to J. City and rc't. Ji oo Chicago to junction City.... iS 40, Chicag-o to j". Citv'and re"t... ]G 7- HATKS OK FAKK TO )t .VCTIO.N fllV, \- 1 A KANSAS I'ACIMC IfAlLW.W. From First Class. Steroid Class. J^.mi^-rant. New York .$39 15 .$-- 15 .-j;_,r) o; l-'hiladelphia 37 65 32 15 Baltimore 35 90 32 15 f^cston 40 15 35 30 Ijutialo 33 15 31 30 Cleveland 30 15 ^7 40 Pittsbuiji; 3-2 15 .7. ; an be had at the principal cities east of the Mi'.-sissippi. iAini-i- K.-VTHs OK i!!Eu;iri- ro ji:.\cTjo.N ^:\\\ via kaxs\s i-acii-k- );Air.\v.\^-. From \st Class. i,l Class. 3,/ Class. 4/// Class. New ^'ork -'i^- ^5 ""i'^ 7.3 •*?• 4^^ -i^f 10 Philadelphia - 09 1 (17 i 3S 1 oS ]>altiinore 2 07 ' ^'5 ' .S7 ' '-"7 Chicago I 20 I 05 So 65 St. Leecher, in a recent letter to the Chri.stian Union says: '• The enormous immigration which is this year Hooding the State is going toward the west. The soil is not so fertile, the rainfall less and the droughts more prevalent than in Central and Eastern Kansas. These causes will make the first few years of iniinigrant life more toilsome ^.nd less remunerative than in other portions of the State. IJetter lands, iiX. decidedly cheaper prices, can be had in the eastern and northern counties, where the roads, bridges, towns, churches and schools me established and within reach of all. But the great railroads runnin'->- v.'estward direct the immigration by efficient agencies to their own lands. Men pay six, seven and eight dollars an acre for farms three hundred miles from Kansas City, when better lands can be bought at from three to five dollars an acre in the populous eastern and northern counlifs." >i^±^ On the folU)wingpage is a map showing the immediate vicinity of Junction City and also an engraving of the \vater power near the city. A King iron bridge spans the Republican river directly north of the city, another like bridge crosses the vSmoky Hill at the point marked '• Mill and Water Power,'' and still another iron bridge for public travel crosses the Smoky Hill south of the city, near the railroad c?i-os.sina- of the jSIissouri, Kansas A: Texas railwa\-. The two remaiinng pages of this pamphlet contain a brief and incomplete description of the city and its resources. Nearly every branch of business is represented in Junction City, and it has several fine church edifices — one, the Presln terian, costing $1^,000 — several good business houses and fine dwellin 139 tuiles west ot the Missouri river, 261 miles from the western bounclarv of tiu' State, acjd 67 miles from the norfhern boundary. The town is in the center of a larg^e net-worlc of sinail valievs. Th::rse constitute nia<;niHcent agricultural lands, and the streamo afford pure runnint;" water the year round. It is situated on a beautiful piece of table land surrounded on all sides by gentle ri.sing bluff's. Its town site i.s the handsomest in the State. Its location must make it the comai-?rc:al center of central and Avestern Kansas. Junction City is the county seat of Davis county. It ha.-, a populatior. of 2,i>0(). It affords one of the best markets ii\ the State. Three King iron bridges cross the streams near town. Cl^ur C'^ld water can be had anywhere by digging froni thirty to tift7 feet. It is a live, active, v.'ide-avvake, enterprising town. Its future is very proniising. ACCRS.SIRIMTY. Xo point in Kansas is so easy of access as Junction City. Located right at the conffuence of four great valleys, whose boti;o;ii land » liirnish each the most beautiful natural road-beds in the world, with numberless rich aaid e.ttensivc valleys ali about it, all combine to indicate that nature had ii\tended a common center for a va.-.t regioit. From east to west we have the great through line of the continent — the Kansas and Smoky Hill valleys — 'traversed by the Kansas Pacific Rail- way. To the northwest is the immense valley of the Republican, with its countless tributaries, along which is constructed for fifty miles the Junction City & Ft. Kearney railroad, a branch of the Kansas Facitic. And to the south, but ten miles distant, is the head of the e.:iualh' extensive and fertile valley of the Neosho, .with which wtj have several valley connections and down which points tiie great Mis.souri, Kan.sas i*v: Te.vas Railway, connecting us with the Gulf at (r.alveston. BTlLDlNCi STONK. The blulls surrounding Junction City abound in a I'na'jn.esian liujc- .Ntonc. This stone extends probably forty miles along the valleys of ti'.e lyaiisas and Smoky I [ill rivers, but that varl«?ty of it which if, principally valuable exists t)nly in the inimediatc neighborhood of Junctioii City. The beavity and litness of this stone lor substantial and ornamental buildings have attracted great attention. The State Capitol, at Topeka, i.s built of rock (}iiarrte