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About La Grande evening observer. (La Grande, Or.) 1904-1959 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 3, 1906)
IppJUIlB B. HAIIEORD III "THE UMM Of THE SHREW" M H TO APPEAR AT STEWARD'S OPERA HOUSE THIS EVENING 111 A GREAT DOUBLE BILL "THE OLD GUARD" 4 fir - ft. f V W : tflL 4- u' ' : Mr. Charles r It i at a frank and uncompromising humorist that Shakespeare presents him self in "The Taming of the Shrew."' Yet behind the rollicking fun there is a vein of serious suggestion, and the poet asserts himself at the close most gracefully in his tribute to true martial devotion. Al though the play is farce of the most un compromising type, it requires an actor of fine artistic comprehension to play the role Petruchio acceptably. ' Petruchio is, despite his blustering masquerade, a gen tleman and an actor who conveyed no other impression than that of the boister ous ruffian he assumed to be would be but a faint and unsatisfactory one of the big-hearted, whole souled suitor of a cap tious lady's hand. And the captious lady herself is a combination of opposed traits. Though a shrew, she must be winsome and capable when won of as much wom anly devotion as she was at first of in subordination. Charles B. Hanford is one of the few actors to make Petruchio a character as strong in its humorous appeal as it is in its artistic aspect Miss Marie Drofnah who,' assumed the role of Kath erine has been fortunate in winning ap proval for her performance of it to an ex tent that assures a complete and harmon ious interpretation. Mr. Hanford wilf appaar at Steward's opera house on Saturday Feb. 3, in this v "Hi MISS MARIE DROFNAH, in "The Taming of the Shrew" merry play. DOUBLE BILL The curtain will ring up promptly at eight thirty and a delightful curtain raiser will be presented in which both Mr. Han ford and Miss Drofnah will appear. The curtain raiser is used in order that those who by reason of their occupation will oe unable to come to the theatre at that early hour may come late and still not be compelled to miss any of the "Taming of the Shrew." Tho title of the first piece is "The Old Ouard." This Is taken from an episode of the battle of Waterloo which Victor Hugo has so splendidly described. Mr. Hanford is always ready and willing to give his patrons a full measure for their money and realizing that his appear ance here falls upon a Saturday evening, he has consented to give this double bill in order that all may be able to hear all of the "Taming of the Shrew." - . i BRAMWELL OB MAR BEET CULTURE 1 THE STATE Of (AllRI La Grande, Ore., Feb. 2. 1906. Editor Observer: While jt has been my pleasure to travel in nearly every state in the Union, not uutil now have I. visited California. 1 ""Vmade the present trip in search of infor - s"2fetion, more particularly as to the cul ture of sugar beets, but at the same time in a general way, to ui up the great state mentioned. As I made close observ ations it may be of interest to your many readers to give a few notes, which I do purely with a view of betterment. The state of California has suffered very much from rain, so much, that the wheat planted last fall has rotted. No moisture whatever, having fallen for many months. During my travels there a heavy rain or flood covered the county in general. It is estimated that several million dollars of damage was done by reason of washouts and so much grain CSng destroyed. We saw many hundred (Ijousands of acres, of grain inundate d from one inch to several feet. I am of the opinion that the grain crop in that state will be light this year. The orange crop is especially short and of an inferior quality. I am told that this is caused by reason of the continued cold weather. It is claimed that this state is experiencing . the coldest wiather known for fifteen yy1ar. This accounts for the extremely -sour oranges now on the market While in southern California there is plenty of sunshine and a happy place to spend the winter months, to my mind it is no place for poor working people. The cities are filled with people seeking health and who generally have plenty of money for board and the like is generally high. While the larger cities are well cared for . the smaller ones to my mind indicate less VJhrift than we have manifest here at Tnome. I think however, that I saw no more dead fills on the sidewalks than .we have- not quite so many but in many ways less system then we have. One thing is sjre that I met and saw more unemploy ed men the few days I spent in this state F. S. BRAMWELL than I have seen for many years in the state of Oregon. I made mention of this fact to old timers and I was informed that they flocked there to winter, but to look at some of them, thoy look as though they had been some place to winter for a long time. 1 felt thankful for our winters at home if that keeps away this class of things. Tne farm homee there are much less expensive than ours. I think I am safe in saying that our farm homes wil1 average four times the value of those in the western state, and as to general com fort many, many times better. This speaks very loud to me as to the prosppr ity of the eruntry here as against the one in question. I may say right here that I have seen no valley; no people who are to well provided for as in this country, our own Grande Ronde Valley. Good homee and plenty in them for the comfort of all. Surely we should try and appreciate this fact. I made a trip to Oxnard where the larg est beet sugar factory in the world is operated. The plant there has a capacity of 1800 tone per day. Last year they made 150,000 tons of beets into sugar, making an extraction of upwards of U as against 10 at our factory here. The Oxnard Sugar Co. has a contracted acre age for 1906 for 17000 acres as against about 2,000 here . The people there take to beet culture and accordingly the thing is a grand success. I made a special in vestigation of the cultivation of the ' soil and find in the first place that this Com pauy cultivates much poor alkali land. - I was driven on some tracts where plowing was going on and not ' a epear of vegetation was to be seen, and the top greasey so we could hardly keep our foot ing. This land was being plowed with a 14 inch plow drawn by ten horses or mules and plowed to a depth of 16 inches. The land, when thrown to the top, shone almost like the sun In a looking glass. I remarked to my companion the field boss of the company that they seemingly had a great quantity of alkali to contend with and asked him how they managed to get a stand of beett.To this he said that they plowed the land thus very deep and the ram washed the alkali from the immediate top so the beet seed managed to get started but that the stand in many cases was by no means good, but that to seed immediately after plowing would mean that nothing could grow. This opens up an important subject for this valley ae we have thousands of acres with alkali in, that hitherto has brought but little results to the tiller; while in California this same land brings from 6 to 20 tons of beets per acre. It may be said that they have more moisture than we do. To this I may say that last year no artificial irrigation was employed at all and that for 170 daye no rain fell and if I remember right but 7 inches fell during the year, I was told that the moisture of the alkali made the beet crop, and that without the alkali the crop was much less profitable. The average tonnage in the entire district was a little upwards of 1 4 tons per acre. 1 have always contended that we plow our lands too shallow and to this I may say all here havecontended against my theory. In Oxnard they cannot make a good crop by plowing less than 1 6 inches and in one field I found them using a French Imade plow which has a double mouldboard one making a depth of about H inches and at the end of the field the plow is turned up side down and goes directly back in the sarne furrow to a depth of 22 inches. This is no guess work for we measured the depth and know whereof we speak. I waa told that the deeper the plowing the better the crop. I do not think that to plow so deeply here the first year would be of benefit but to gradually go down will bring better results than we have so far enjoyed. I think this Item will prove of great value to the beet growers of this section. The facts are we have hoped for a long SO inch beet; while we have plowed but about f rom 6 to 1 0 inches in depth. If we can subject the now almost worth iest land and make it produce like that now in question, thie Valley is the best and richest in the United States of its size. I see no reason why we cannot bring Into play the land lying in the center of this valley and make it among the best This case to which we now site is by no means the only one of which we have knowledge. In and about Lehl, Utah, where land was worth about five to ten doliare per acre, the culture of sugar beete has brought that same land on the market at from $100 to $300 per acre. We have found here to that where some alkali is in the land the tonnage has been good. I call attention to the farm known as the Child ers place about three miles south and and east from this city. In 1904 we sold the beets off this place 122 acres for $7,2 1 0. 1 4. We charged for all labor per formed on this place at regular prices even though done by our own teams and the actual cost of producing this crop was $4,080.14 making a net gain of exactly $3,040, or nearly half the cost of the land. This farm was considered very poor and when we bought it many gave us "the horse laugh", All who are acquaint ed with the conditions of the operation of this farm know that very little water was used except in the winter time. These figures can be seen at our office. I sim ply give them to better indicate what can be done on this line by close applica tion. I have already made mention of the coet of plowing land at Oxnard, That ten horsee or mules are used on one 14 inch plow. Here our land is much easier to work, costing less than half what this must have cost when plowed ae above set out This le also true of the plow used to pull the beete in the fall. Here we use a forked plow drawn often by two horses and never more than three, while at Oxnard they have to use a solid up right plow which is drawn by twelve horees. The ground gets so hard that the plow we use will not do the work there. This ts also strong evidence in favor of us making crops without water. Surely our land cannot get harder or drier than to take twelve horses to plow or pull beete. While our plows pull the beete, at Oxnard the beete cannot be pulled, hence the plow must go under them, done at great cost Even with all these odds against the beet ',' growers they are loyal to the enterprise, ' and it is prosperous, exceedingly so. 1 In conclusion 1 beg to say. Hitherto ' the eugar factory here has lost vast sums of money. Only one season since it has 1 been operated has it paid its way. Thie because of insufficient beete, eo very few 2 taking interest in this kind of culture. Much talk has been made that the fact- ' ory would be taken away, perhaps so " much said that it has been taken as a bluff. In this matter I desire to eay that -we have bought large tracts of land and propose to grow as many beets as possi- -ble but candidly I am of the opinion that., unless we make a much better showing this year than at any time in the past the factory will be removed and perhape then and perhaps not till then, will we appre ciate what it hae done for this country. ' We propose . to handle the business as hitherto on business lines, pay for all we get and try our level best to make the thing tnrive, but unless we get better sup port than in the past the factory will cer tainly be a thing of the past. It is claim ed by some that if we raieed the price of beete that mora would be grown. We are willing for you to examine our books and you will readily see that we have paid more for beete than we could afford to do' so few being grown. To my mind the better way to get the price advanced or increased is to make the thing prosperous and then ask the company to divide pro fits. I am sure they are willing to divide so far, It is claimed by eorne that thie company pays less for beets than is paid elsewhere. This is absolutely untrue when the quality is considered. At Ox nard they extracted upwards of 14 while here we get exactly 10,, nearly one third less out of the beete than they, while we pay a flat rata of $4.60 per ton ' while the pay from $3.25 to $6.25, an average of about the same as we pay, possibly a little more. We are willing to advance money to help people embark in the beet business. We contemplate dig ging a well on one of our farms near this -city and install a gasoline pump ae a test and we think that the many little stream which now run to waste can be brought to the eervice in this way and made to pay the operator very handsomely indeed. W ar interested in the development of the entire country, w are willing to do our share at all times and in any legitimates way, for the general welfare of the peo ple here. We hope to have better support so that our business may be of greater benefit It has alrendy don much and may be made do much more. I am thankful for my home in thi country. The land i good, the peopl generally broad minded, "and It shall b my pleasare to aid in any reasonable way to dewelope the country and make it in- . viting for thote who may visit us, so that they may Join us in making this the very best country in the United States if not In. th world. F. S. Bramvxll.