Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 February 1889 — A DELIGHTFUL COUNTRY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

A DELIGHTFUL COUNTRY

AUTHENTIC STATISTICS IN REGARD TO DAKOTA TERRITORY. Its Assessed Valuation, Banks, Newspapers, Schools, and Churches —Largest Wheat Yield of Any State or Territory— An Array of Facts for Home-Seekers. [SPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE.] Mandan, Dak., Jan. 21,1889. No section of the Union has received more attention in the last few years than Dakota, owing to its wonderful growth, yet few realize the enormous possibilities of the Territory. In 1870 there was not a town for a thousand miles from the western end of Lake Superior to the mining camps •of Montana, except military posts. Now towns and .cities are strung along the railroads like pearls on a string, and the Territory has risen to~leadership in population and wealth. It has an assessed valuation of one hundred and sixty-two million dollars; twenty-five States have fewer banks; only fourteen have more newspapers, and the schools outnumber those of California, with three times the population. Instead of

beimr entirely a wide plain, the Territoryhas over 3,000,000 acres of timber. 1,200 miles of navigable rivers, besides numerous lakes and small streams. Western Dakota is full of coal, and coal gives to Northern lands what Emerson calls a “portable climate.” Cold can be kept out. but not heat. A good many coal mines have already been opened up along the Northern Pacific Railroad, the veins varying in thickness from three to twelve feet. Farmers in many localities dig their supplies from the outcroppings in the hill sides. The chief mineral district of the Territory is in the Black Hills, where are found the largest gold stamp mills in the world. Dakota, too, is favored in the matter of easily obtained artesian wells, which,, in some places, are being used to run machinery, the water coming with such force. Dakota’s wheat crop of 1887 exceeded all the other States and Territories in the number of bushels sixty-two million, while in the yield of ©ate it took fourth place, and in corn exceeded two-thirds of the States.. Dakota's crops are grown on land worth an average of sl9 an acre as against SSO and SIOO land in the States. Seven counties of Dakota in 1887 raised twenty-three million, bushels of wheat and eleven million bushels of oats. This was in the valley of theRed River of the North, which Bavard Taylor called the Nile of America. The soil of Dakota needs no fertilizer or irrigation. All the crops of the last Federal-census year were produced upon an area but little greater than that ot Dakota. Who can figure the results when intelligence has subjected the full acreage of this mighty territory to human use? And a mightier domain lies to the west, rich with minerals, forests, and agricultural and grazing lands. The settlement of Dakota is mainly confined to the eastern part. It has only been in the last four or live years that settlers began to occupy the country west of the Missouri, and as yet the settlements are mostly along the line of the Northern Pacific Railroad. The topography and climate of Western Dakota are peculiar: it is prairie-,, with buttes or odd-shaped points of earth prominent everywhere. In the grassy sides of the buttes lignite coal crops out. The soil of the broad slopes and valleys is rich,, and produces all the staple crops of the North. The country is well watered by the Heart, Cannonball, Knife, Green, Sweetbriar, Little Missouri and other streams, along which there is considerable growth of timber and wild fruits. The climate- i&

A DAKOTA COUNTY LARGER THAN TWO BASTERW STATES. milder than in Eastern Dakota, owing to the hills, which break the force of the north winds, and to the influence of the Chinook breezes from the west. The winter is much shorter than in Minnesota. There is more variety in landscape and resources than in Eastern Dakota,, fuel costs but little, and stone is abundant tor building purposes; but, more than al), tree homesteads can still be had almost in sight of the cars, an advantage not found anywhere else in the United States in a general farming region. To open a farm on a free quarter section of land means the creation of a property worth Irom $1,500 to $2,000. but it takes work. The chief town, of Western Dakota, the Black Hills not being included in this review, is Mandan, three miles from the western end of the Northern Pacific bridge across the Missouri, the only place the Big Muddy is bridged in Dakota. Mandan is county seat of Morton County, and to further impress the reader with the vastness of Dakota, we give a diagram of the county, which contains over 100 townships of land, area enough to allow the States of Rhode Island and Delaware to be spread over its ample bosom. The present population of Morton County, 6.000, could be increased to 60,000, and yet not be crowded as an agricultural region. Twothirds of it is still vacant land. Mandan is to Western Dakota what Fargo is to Northeastern Dakota, Sioux Falk to Southeastern Dakota, and Deadwood to the Black

HUts. |

MOSES FOLSOM,

One touch of a blizzard would make the plumbers grin.—ATew York Manning Journal.

AS LARGE AS TEN EASTERN STATES.