Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (May 1, 1880)
May, 1880. THE WEST SHORE. '35 ington Territory without liability to failure nine years out of every ten, it bents the Western States, and never fear, the time is coming when good market! will be opened for it. What consists in "an exceedingly small portion of the land," within SO VAST A TERRITORY as Washington, in the mind of the ed itor, the reader is left to vaguely im agine, lie means, however, that no forest land is "capable of being culti vated " until cleared of timber, 1 sup pose. A large proportion ol the trees in Michigan are pine, the stumps of which arc equally troublesome to the fanner as fir and cedar stumps will be Washington Territory. Still Michigan farmers manage to get along, enduring besides this the dreadful cold winters which are more to be feared. Some of our most prosperous States now teeming with happy people, wcr not so many years since a howling wil derness. True, Washington Territory " forests abound in wild animals," but as the country settles up it will be rare sport for the nimrods to clear them out. If our forefathers had backed down at the mere mention of "varmint," their grandchildren would never have been worth a cent. WACOM UOADS will be constructed in due time, not withstanding the city editor's pen lias made it " impossible." Self-interest takes many Eastern farmers to Oregon and Washington Territory) perhaps, and no doubt with the right sort of energy ;uid Industry they gain in the long run more than is lost "by the operation." The ma jority of farmen who go there, let us hope, have a home and the future wel fare of their children in view. LUEINO ADVEB 1 ISSMSM 1 s sent out by "land sharks'1 in the South, induce many Northern ami Eastern people to go there with the expectation of becoming rich in a short time. I hey arc generally disappointed, aird those who ran, soon seek a home in a climate more safe and agreeable. J he super abundance of pilfering blacks ami yeuly visitation of yellow fever, arc disadvantages of the "Sunny South" too widely published to need ventila tion. Farms may be had there on very cany terms, but the new-comer must prepare high roosts for the domestic fowls, strong and close pens for the pigs, and an inexhaustible purse to pay the doctor bill-. Of Kansas, "the garden of the South west, hctitiously so called, 1 KB DISADVANTAGE! ire rarely told, and it is the best adver tised of all the Western States. The roving emigrant need hardly go so far is the Pacific Coast for novelty. What with periodical grasshopper plagues, intuial drouths invariably attended by myriad armies of chinch-bugs that in fest the fields destroying the promising wheat and changing the darkly green corn to a sickly yellow, files thickly covering the prairies in summer, 1 plague to bipeds and quadrupeds in doors and out, late spring frosts fatal to budding fruit and damaging to youn wheat, wintry blasts in mid-summer known as Nor'vvestcrs, surprising th farmer reeking with perspiration in hi shirt-sleeves, and sending him shiver Ing, teeth chattering, double-quick to 1 .1 1 ... .1 a 1 c & IQQK tnc k miicu me, ncsmcs ircqucni destructive hail-storms, water-spouts, cyclones, and fearful thunder-storms, electric displays in a ten less sky, the play of the lightning and the roar of the thunder dazzling ami deafening beyond description, but followed by no refreshing rain, surely Kansas is sup plied with novelty enough if novelties are possessed ol charms, iicmusinc hardy, indeed, to endure year after year such appalling disadvantages and BE HAi'l-v. I defy any one to say, conscientiously, that I have over-stated anything People in Eastern Slates are infatu ated with Kansas by reading wonder fill stories eulogising its delightful climate, the marvelous cures wrought upon bronchial and pulmonaiv aflbo lions, and exhilarating edicts of the pure air, etc. Nothing can be more absurd. Those throat and lung al factions exist, Bl times, to an alarming extent. Could it be otherwise in country where in summer the fun, the umbrella and the overcoat are in icqiii sitiou often during the same day, and the wind blows for weeks successively tilling the air no thickly with dust that one cannot sec objects a rod diitant The hot south wind is the crowning evil. It renders life a burden and torment to the hard-toiling farmer. do not expect this article to turn one emigrant away from Kansas. Let him come here, and a few years bulletiug .i.t a isa . wttn trie soum winci win moi lil'I'KCTfAt.l.V TUU N IIIM A WAV if he is able to get away after gaining bis experience) I have known it dur ing spring and SURimer to blow cease lessly at the rate of ninety miles an hour, almost without a variation, night Hid day for three long weeks. Noth ing is visible beyond the distance of a few rods through the dense clouds of dust swept from the cultivated lields. The line dust is silled into the houses through Key-boles and between sashes and sills of the most tightly closed win- lows. People close their doors and partake of meals in I heir cellars. Hedge rows and stone femes become banked upon either side with dust until horse men can ride over them with the great est facility, and they arc rendered worthless to prevent the trespassing of slock. After one of these frequent dust storms, 1 have witnessed people CI.KANINO OUT THIS IH'HT from their second lloor rooms with a large scoop-shovel and a coal bucket. It is liner than Hour, and drifts up in little banks on the lloor through 1111 opening just large enough to insert the lade of a case-knife in. Every spot of moisture on the prairie is lapped up by the wind s hot breath, leaving the ground pan bed and dry. The waving wheat and nodding corn withers and Ilea as il passes over, and the prairie- grass turns yellow, as if scorched by lire. Tiees transplanted to the irrairic w never attain a vigorous growth. Their trunks become Ivvisled ami their houghs ICraggy, and owing to being forced to can toward the north the greater por tion of the time by the wind, they grow bent in that dlrSftlOTh aWBlltlg, 111 (lllkll Weather, to have an nihility to the mag netic pole. Time arc really men in Kansas who believe it is a good country, but they win- boffl and raised here mid were never forty miles from their own dug outs, and consequently KNOW NO III. I I I II. Other parties who claim so much for "The Garde of the Southwest," have selfish interests to promote and are troubled very little with a conscience that might check them from king cb I joqucnt like Eli Perkins.