EASTERNNORTH CAROLINAFOR THEFARMER
Atlantic Coast LineVIRGINIA--NORTH CAROLINA--SOUTH CAROLINA--ALABAMA--FLORIDA--GEORGIA
Atalantic Coast Line Company Logo
Issued byPassenger DepartmentAtlantic Coast LineThe Standard Railroad of the SouthWilmington, N.C.
WILLIAM MADISON RANDALL LIBRARY
IN MEMORY OF HELEN HAGAN
1909-1990
Eastern North Carolina For the FarmerWritten by ALLEN MAULL Advertising Agent Atlantic Coast LinePREFATORY ARE you a real farmer who is reading this booklet—getting this invitation from the ATLANTIC COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY and the good people of the towns mentioned here? Are you a real man? Can you work an acre for all it is worth? Can you work it with your own hands at the plow? Can you wait for a good stand of crops before big yields? Can you take weather as it comes?—and it usually comes very easy down here. Can you take advice from the successful, and follow good examples? When information is needed, will you go to those who are competent to render it? If you cannot say yes in your heart to all of these questions, then hand this booklet to your neighbor and ask him to read it. Successful farming is hard work and a fighter's battle. Half a dozen kickers and loafers can put an entire farming section of the best State in the Union out of tune with success. We want real farmers or real men who will make good farmers down here in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, and there is plenty of real land for them to buy. It is not being given away nor are any gold bonds being thrown in as souvenirs, but it is cheap. It is cheap plus a climate that doubles its productiveness. Many of the Northern farmers who have come down here are getting rich, but they are sweating for every dollar of it. If this sounds good to you, come down to this section, stop at the various towns mentioned here and look this splendid country over. This invitation is to the man who tills the soil, trims the tree and trains the vine, or who would like to do it. Issued by Passenger Traffic Department ATLANTIC COAST LINE The Standard Railroad of the South W. J. CRAIG, Passenger Traffic Manager T. C. WHITE, General Passenger AgentWILMINGTON, NORTH CAROLINATHE FARMER'S OPPORTUNITY
There be three things which make a nation great and prosperous—a fertile soil, busy workshops, and easy conveyance for man and goods from place to place.
BACON.
MR. FARMER, HERE IS OUR PROPOSITIONA Quick Decision Necessary
IF a business man were offered the choice of two investments, one which would require $2,000 and the other from $16,000 to $20,000, and each would bring the same annual revenue, it is idle to ask which of the two would get his money. If a farmer were offered his choice of two farms of equal fertility in the same neighborhood, one at forty dollars per acre and the other at two hundred and forty, it is easy to see which of the two he would buy. The fact that he already owns the high-priced land does not make any difference, from a business point of view. He must make his farm yield a revenue based upon an investment of $240 per acre, or whatever the land may be worth, or else he is losing money. How does this strike you, Mr. Farmer? Does it not make plain to you the lack of business judgment you are exhibiting in staying on your high-priced Northern farm when you can get rich, virgin and more productive land in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA for one-third of the money of what your farm will sell for, and you can live in a climate that is kind to you the year round? Does this proposition appeal to your intelligence? If it does, investigate.
LET'S “GET DOWN TO BRASS TACKS”IN THIS CROP TALK
Products From the Eastern North Carolina Fields
WE have been widely informed that the surpassing wealth of these United States has come from the fact that we have a most bountiful soil. This is true; but it is only a half truth, nevertheless. The factory, the farm, the mine, the sea have given to us of their boundless wealth. But the potential wealth of this country was here in 1492, just as it is now. So Adam Smith was exactly right when he said that all wealth comes from labor applied to land. The writer inserts one word and says that all wealth comes from INTELLIGENT labor applied to land.
Then, the next question is, What is the one great thing in the evolution of wealth? And I answer that it is HONEST, INTELLIGENT labor.
NORTH CAROLINA will be the richest country the world has ever seen when we have liberated intellect. It is intellect, supplemented by physical labor, that will make NORTH CAROLINA famous the world over for its bountiful production of food—riches. NORTH CAROLINA is now forging toward the lead as a quality and quantity producer of many of the Nation's staple crops. The climate, soil and general conditions give it advantages in producing cotton and tobacco—now its greatest crops—large yields of corn and an exceptional quantity of fruits and vegetables of all kinds.
Practically every crop grown and harvested in the various states of the Union may be successfully cultivated, and with profit, upon the Coastal Plains of Eastern North Carolina.
Long summers of growing weather, mild winters and a genial sky permit the practice of husbandry for nearly twelve months of the year. There is scarcely a day that some character of work may not be carried on in the field. This fact is one that may be surprising to the farmers from the Northern corn and wheat belts, who are accustomed to the rigors and inconveniences of at least six months of exceedingly cold weather, when cattle must be housed and fed, and the plow remain idle, expense going on and the ground producing nothing but frost. Then, too, the farmers in the marrow-chilling, fuel-eating, wind-swept North are compelled
Harvesting Vetch and Wheat mixed, May 12th, on G. H. Thompson's Farm near Chadbourn. Yield 3½ tons per acre. Fifty bushels of corn were made per acre on same ground the same year.
to give their attention to one crop—a character of farming which must, in the long run, cripple both farm and farmer, and which renders the seasons long and arduous periods of anticipation, anxiety and complete ruin when mortgages overwhelm and creditors become insistent.
North Carolina's staple cotton crop ranks among the best grown and sells at an advance of from two to five cents per pound over ordinary market quotations. Northern farmers find no trouble whatever in growing cotton. Any man that can grow wheat can easily and profitably grow cotton.
This section of the State, by reason of the peculiarities of soil, can be made the banner producer of Irish potatoes. Every climatic and physical condition is just right for it. The vital essentials to successful and profitable breeding and fattening of live stock are here. They are, good food, plenty of pure water, and healthful climatic conditions. Good food means plentiful pasture and fodder crops, as well as grain when necessary, and it is not enough that nutritive and fattening grasses and grains can be raised in plenty. BUT IT IS ALSO NECESSARY THAT THEY BE PRODUCED CHEAPLY ENOUGH so that in fattening cattle the beef ready for the market SHALL NOT COST AN EXCESSIVE PRICE.
Cottonseed meal has no equal as an animal food. Cow peas grow better in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA than in any other portion of the South. Bermuda grass makes a remarkable growth. When cultivated properly, it is said that one acre will feed a steer in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA. Lespedeza, or Japan Clover, is a valuable crop because it fits well between other crops and requires little or no work in busy seasons of the year. Velvet beans under intelligent cultivation and handling have netted our farmers as high as $35 per acre.
Peanuts, the value of which as a stock food is high, bringing $1.60 a bushel, and the hay is worth from $12 to $18 per ton. The stock raising possibilities are enormous. Broom corn can be raised here and when of good quality will bring anywhere from sixty to eighty dollars a ton.
Just common sense and a few facts are all that are necessary to make money at poultry raising in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA. The egg season is long and the loss of small chickens from storms is light. Markets are everywhere and the demand strong. Feed can be grown at a minimum cost.
Strawberries of most delicious flavor and of fine size, color and abundant yield can be raised and laid down at any one of the populous cities on the Atlantic seaboard at a time of the year when choice fruit brings a fancy price. The average net profit per acre from strawberries, when quality fruit is raised and care given to packing and shipment, is from $100 to $200.
Four towns in this section of the State this year shipped over $175,000 worth of Huckleberries. This fact, in itself, is the greatest evidence of what compensations Nature furnishes in the way of foods to mankind in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA.
Melons and Grapes, especially the Scuppernong, of which EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA is the Natural home and for which it is famed the world over, are of fine flavor, firm and good size and excellent shippers. Watermelons and Cantaloupes, in quality and quantity, cannot be excelled by any other section in these United States.
In the truck crops EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA has attained a distinction that is enviable. Quite a number of places in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, served by the ATLANTIC COAST LINE, have developed their trucking possibilities and great profits have been made.
The ATLANTIC COAST LINE has provided facilities in the prompt transportation of fruit and vegetable trains to the market centers without delay, making this development possible.
Of course, in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, like all other places, the yield of staple and special crops is always in proportion to the effort and labor expended, but the man who will come to this section and work, and work intelligently, cannot fail to make money on a farm. EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA is not a land of dreams. To prosper here you have to work, and only as you work will you prosper. It is an unusual country in many respects, and is not subject to the general law. It is unusual in climate, in products and crop returns. Its growing season is long; the stimulus of warmth and moisture to plant growth under intelligent methods is surprising. Of course, there are detractors. Men fail here as elsewhere. They buy without seeing, or they buy without judgment; they hire the land cultivated while living in town, or they do their own work in a slipshod way. Under like conditions men fail everywhere, and then find fault with the land or climate.
The writer has failed to mention production costs and profits for the reason that these important factors in farm economics are always predicated upon the MAN and HIS METHODS. Not only the truck crops, but the general farm production, where money is made, are dependent upon proper cultural methods.
If you will farm RIGHT upon the good EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA land you are going to buy you will not only “make two blades of grass grow where one grew before,” but you will be making dollars grow for yourself where only pennies grew before. There is a wealth of gold in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA soil, but you have to work to get it out, and only as you work will you prosper.
TRANSPORTATION AND MARKETSEvery farmer should carefully consider the marketing facilities of a section of country new to him before locating and investing there. EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA points mentioned in this booklet and located upon the ATLANTIC COAST LINE are exceptionally fortunate with reference to good markets and their accessibility. The service of excellence furnished by the ATLANTIC COAST LINE makes this condition a postive fact. It is prompt and efficient. Richmond is but a short distance away; Norfolk, one of the greatest distributing points for early vegetables, is a termini of the Atlantic Coast Line upon the North. Washington, Baltimore, Wilmington, Delaware, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, and an hundred populous cities of the North Atlantic seaboard, with their great consuming population, makes a market for this center the year round, and one that gives this section a distinct advantage over those of other portions of the United States.
A double track nearly all the way upon the main line of the ATLANTIC COAST LINE from Jacksonville to Washington, D. C., is a prime factor in contributing toward the expeditious handling of through and local freight.
All freight cars bought by the ATLANTIC COAST LINE during the past five years have been constructed for the purpose of carrying vegetables and fruits, as well as other commodities. In addition to this facility, this company maintains icing stations at frequent intervals between Tampa and Richmond, Virginia, for the purpose of providing an even temperature from grower to the market.
Picking Peas on W. H. Owen's Farm near Fayetteville in Cumberland
County.
The evidence of value to a country of the “Small farm well tilled” is as old as history and as new as the dew of the morning. It means intensive cultivation—substitution of certainty for uncertainty; farming with the mind; a defense against disaster. It is an economic gain. I do not mean to say that “Three Acres and Liberty” will work here in any wide way, nor that “Ten Acres Enough” is wisdom under the conditions which obtain here. But 40, 60, 80 acres for the average man is ample and all that he can handle. This gives him room for various crops, a field of clover, alfalfa, cow peas, vetch, a small orchard, a truck field, some berries; room for poultry, a few cows and hogs and his twenty acres in cotton. This is the basic need of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA—diversified production. It is in line with the whole tendency everywhere—smaller holdings and better tillage. France is prosperous because she has a multitude of small farms—two millon under 12 acres. Denmark has but 1,900 farms of from 250 to 300 acres, but 150,000 from 7 to 20 acres, and the Government helps the man who will buy a small farm. The Island of Jersey has indifferent soil and climate, yet on farms of from 5 to 20 acres supports 1,300 people to the square mile.
There was a period—now passing, we are thankful to say—when the State of North Carolina was neither prosperous nor contented. The reason was too much land, too many mules, too much ignorant labor, and the Government and the State Departments of Agriculture has doubled the production of cotton, corn, tobacco and truck crops by teaching better methods of farming. The demonstration farm, managed by the farmer himself, under competent instruction, has begun a beneficent revolution in North Carolina. And if men will come here who believe in modern methods and settle along the line of the ATLANTIC COAST LINE RAILWAY, and who know how to farm, they will find a field in which modest fortunes can be made under conditions of great comfort.
OUR SOILS HAVE STOOD THE ACID TEST OF TIMESoils of Marvelous “Quickness”
The farmer wants good soil, but he is apt to want a good deal of it. He puts acreage against climate. He ignores bad climatic conditions for the sake of a big farm. This has been the attraction of the South—broad acres. Today the wise farmer is considering fewer acres and better tillage. He has learned that a small farm well tilled is better than a large farm with its untilled corners and waste places. He has learned that the light soils of the Coastal Region are the “quickest”
A Harnett County Watermelon “Patch.”
and of greater diversity of production than all others. That they are the types that endure—the types that stay by you—in fact, the soil is the land itself. The Coxville series of soils, which occur along the seacoast, which are usually associated with the Norfolk and Portsmouth types, are the ones that prevail in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA. The Norfolk fine sandy loam. Norfolk sandy loam and the Portsmouth fine sandy loam are recognized as the very finest types necessary for plant growth the world over. The Norfolk fine sandy loam is the natural corn and truck soil of the Coastal region, and where it has been ill treated for many years by inferior cultivation its productivity can be more quickly restored by organic matter and proper drainage than any other soil types. The Portsmouth fine sandy loam is the most important cotton soil of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, both in areal extent and adaptation to the crop.
The Coxville fine sand is the most extensively used for the production of truck crops. It occurs along the stream areas and is well charged with organic matter and is naturally soft and friable.
The State Department of Agriculture claim that not ten per cent of the Portsmouth soils have been reclaimed and used for agricultural purposes. The amount of truck production is so insignificant as not to permit of any numerical estimate. The usable area of the soils indigenous to this section of the State is therefore very great, and the crops which may be grown depend rather upon the adequacy of drainage than upon any other factor aside from transportation facilities. When proper drainage, both ditch and tile, is supplied and intelligent cultivation is made upon the Norfolk and Portsmouth soil types, production is no problem.
These soil types are the most generally useful of the United States.
NATURE'S COMPENSATIONSThe Huckleberry Crop
The writer believes that the section of the United States lying contiguous to the Atlantic Ocean and extending from Savannah, Georgia, up to and including Camden, N. J., gives mankind more compensations for life than any other portion of these United States. This past season has seen over $175,000 paid out for huckleberries by buyers to merchants in four towns on the Atlantic Coast Line in this section of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA—Clinton, Faison, Warsaw and Mount Olive. Other towns market huckleberries, of which no account has been taken in this estimate, and those familiar with the marketing of this prolific crop claim that its returns will easily net over one-quarter of a million dollars. These berries grow wild. No attempt at cultivation is made. The possibilities of the cultivation of this crop for the market is one that presents golden opportunities.
Get a slice of this rich mellow land near Rocky Mount. Forty acres enough.—That is all any
man can handle if the land is devoted to diversified farming. “Fewer acres and
better tillage is the slogan here now.
Drainage is an important problem all over the South, and it is of especial importance to EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA. During the past ten years many canals have been cut, narrow, deep ditches dug, and now the interest in tile drainage is being awakened. So far as known very little tile drainage has been used in this Coastal Region. With some means of accommodating run-off water at times of heavy downpours it is determined that tile drainage is very beneficial on the Coxville and the Norfolk and Portsmouth loam soils. Adequate drainage, like irrigation, spells the difference between success and failure to farmers the world over, because there is no place where there is a perfect “balance in Nature,” and periods occur here as well as elsewhere when plant growth suffer from too much or too little water.
A FEW NORTH CAROLINA FACTS WORTH KNOWINGNorth Carolina is increasing in prosperity at a rapid rate. It is liberating intelligence through the public school. This is being reflected in increased production. The corn production increased 44 per cent since 1909, and now equals annually the enormous sum of 55,000,000 bushels. Wheat gained 94 per cent and has an annual production of approximately 8,000,000 bushels. Oats gained 35 per cent and there are about 4,000,000 bushels raised annually. Cotton production gained 70 per cent, averaging one and one half million bales.
The census of 1910 showed the population to be 2,206,287; the number of farmers to be 253,726, and the size of the farms have decreased from 316 acres in 1860 to 88 acres in 1910. This year finds a still greater decrease. In 1860 North Carolina had 23,762,979 acres of farm land and the products amounted to only $1,143,201. Since that time the products from our farms have run up to the enormous sum of $537,729,210, and the State ranks eighteenth in value of farm products.
It is estimated that we have an annual deficit of production of food products below consumption of between $40,000,000 and $50,000,000. This condition makes splendid opportunities for the newcomers—farmers especially—in growing food products to make up for this deficit.
When our farmers raise the food crops and animals needed for the State, and become exporters and not importers, prosperity will have come to stay.
“Way down yonder in the corn field” in Wayne County. Not an acre of land in Eastern North
Carolina but what can be made to average one hundred bushels to the acre
when cultivated right.
The life of the EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA farmer is one of healthfulness, profit and certainty. This is a country of large things and the right place for the small farmer to accomplish much with little. Being able to grow two and three crops upon the same land in the course of a year makes easy the problem of getting started which the farmer finds so hard eleswhere. When the right place is secured, if you are buying undeveloped land, erect a temporary house at small cost, that is, if your resources are limited. There are saw mills every few miles. Lumber is plentiful and reasonably cheap. It will protect you from the sunshine and rain; and, as for winter, there is very little of that, especially in the extreme Southern portion of this section, and in the Northern regions of the Coastal Plain, it is only of two or three months duration, but plenty of fuel is available at small cost. Sheds for your live stock should, of course, be substantial. Buy a good horse, preferably a mare, a good cow, a few chicks just hatched and some young hens. Start a garden. Then get something into the ground, watch it, tend it carefully, planting other crops as the season advances. The climate will favor you and the soil will respond generously to your labor. Stick first to the crops you have been used to. DO INTENSIVE RATHER THAN EXTENSIVE FARMING. If you do your duty by them, the cow, the chickens and the garden will keep your table pretty well supplied—the most important item of farm economy—and after a bit your crops will come on for harvest. Gradually get together a herd of live stock. They are the best farm-builders in the world. Besides, there is good profit in them for market. Put your hens to work for you. EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA CAN BE MADE THE CHICKEN CENTER OF THE WORLD. Conditions are just right for it. Hogs should be raised. There's big money in them, and the hog, like the cow, is valuable in maintaining the fertility of your farm. Don't forget the trees. Almost all of the Coastal Plain section of NORTH CAROLINA is a good fruit country. Set out fig, peach, apple and pecan as soon as possible. Tomatoes and strawberries are usually sure profit-makers. Get an individual canning outfit, so that your surplus of vegetables and fruits can be preserved for carrying over the dormant periods of the year. It eliminates waste upon your farm and permits you to utilize and sell that portion of your products of a perishable nature that would otherwise rot on the trees or ground. The cost of living is low. Taxes are at a minimum.
COME AND LOOK OVER THIS GLORIOUS LAND.
Eastern North Carolina is rapidly increasing its corn production in both quantity and quality.
Corn Field of D. F. Hester near Whiteville. 75 bushels to the acre.
ONLY
When a man contenplates moving into a farming section that is new to him his first protective precaution should be to familiarize himself with the CASH CROPS of that community. In appraising the EASTERN section of the State, with an eye to a future home and a better fortune, the Northern farmer may count WITH ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY upon three money crops—COTTON, CORN and TOBACCO—and the by-products of the farm for which there is a steady demand at good prices—butter, eggs, poultry, milk and cream, and truck and fruit crops in neighborhoods where selling associations are formed. The ones I have just enumerated are standard crops and can be turned into money.
SOME THINGS EVERY FARMER MUST LEARNIt does not pay to raise things to suit your fancy altogether. Raise things to suit the buyer's fancy. Try to raise the things that no one else will have and that everyone else will want. Give good measure, but make the customer pay well for what he gets. Never cut prices because some other fellow is running around selling cheaper than you are. Don't worry; the man who sells too cheaply will soon go out of buisness, anyway.
People buy with their eyes, and highly-colored fruit and large, perfect vegetables always sell better.
Don't overrate anything; rather underrate it. Then you can sell to the same person day after day.
A SYSTEM THAT WILL BE A SURE WINNERIn Eastern North Carolina
You must know your business to earn a good income. If you are growing cotton you ought to know all about cotton, and make it your principal business. BUT had luck with labor and other vicissitudes hits the just and the unjust. You are depending upon cotton for your income and it might be taken away in a night.
Suppose you had a chicken coop, a garden, some live stock and a field of clover besides your cotton; also a few dairy cows and some pure bred hogs—you would be pretty independent, wouldn't you?
The farmer coming here from another State, or the one who is already here, who can rise above the temptation to raise all cotton, and raises live stock instead
“Green Fields and a good herd.” Symbols of Peace and Prosperity near Wilmington.
Dairying is a safe business.
and feeds the man who raises all cotton, is a SURE WINNER. The soil and climatic conditions and experiments covering many years demonstrate that EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA is perfectly adapted to the growing of staple farm crops. With this rich soil and favoring climate, all that is needed is intelligent farming.
Most of us think of the woman on the farm as “the farmer's wife.” It wouldn't sound just right to speak of her as Mrs. Farmer, but we'll have to get used to it. There are more women farmers now than ever before—not those who work in the fields, but those who manage their own farms. And why should they not? It is easy to say that woman's place is the home. Woman's sphere is anything that she can do, and do well; just as man's work is that which he can do best. The mother-heart easily extends itself to the care of pets—their poultry, their horses, hogs and cattle. To raise grain to feed these animals is easy and natural. “Civilization began with the domestication of animals,” says Alfred Russel Wallace. Women who care for animals and live close to the soil keep well. EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA presents some very alluring possibilities to those women who desire to “get back to the farm.”
The number of women in America who own farms and successfully manage them is on the increase. Women have always raised the “garden sass” and poultry. She succeeded with these when often the men failed with the big things. And now she is taking a hand all along the line. Woman is a natural farmer. The word “wife” means weaver. Woman furnishes the home. She cooks, prepares and serves the food. Her business is to minister. Usually what women are interested in, they do well.
NORTH CAROLINIANS DEVELOPING SPLENDIDEDUCATIONAL FACILITIES
Education and proper cultivation of the soils are the two main topics of conversation in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA today, and when people talk about reforms, a demand is created, and where the people in a mass demand a thing, it is always provided. North Carolina has a most efficient system of public schools in the various cities and towns, and has had for many years, but it was only recently—the past ten years—that an intelligent interest and effort has been directed toward rural schools. At the present time rural schools are receiving great attention
A Portion of J. R. Bell's 80-acre Model Farm near Mount Olive, the products from which
sold for $8,000 last year.
and are being increased in both their quality and quantity; the length of the scholastic year and the physical needs of the service.
Farmers coming here will now find excellent schools for their children within easy reach of their homes. In all of the cities and towns there are good graded schools.
THE SETTLER'S INTERESTThe farmer who is looking toward EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA is vitally interested in the present condition—first, because the transition from primitive conditions in a great forest and sparse rural population makes elbow room for him and means opportunity; second, because these EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA lands are well capable of maintaining a population almost one hundred times more dense than it has now, and the chance for the settler's farm mounting in value with the years is especially good. The remarkable versatility and “quickness” of the soil is another great advantage. This is a diversified farm country. The very condition which will keep cotton, corn, tobacco and oat fields will increase the market for the man who produces truck and special fruit crops that go to feed the country. The situation is in every way to his advantage. If he looks at it from the point of view of a comfortable living, nowhere on the continent can he grow so many things or attain so high an acre production, when intelligent methods are used, or surround himself with so great a variety of good things which grow here to perfection. All of the berries and fruits of the catalogue, and all of the vegetables and salads that grace the table of the epicure nearly every month in the year, can be grown about his house and farm buildings, and he may live as luxuriously as he wishes from the product of his garden.
The conditions in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA today profits the settler by the new opportunities it develops. It is directly to your advantage. Mr. Northern Farmer, that EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA has a surplus of land and a dearth of land-owners—that is, of farmers. Here is elbow room; here are prices regulated by a sparse rural population; the choice of superb lands in attractive localities, made doubly valuable by the communities around them.
The lands in the counties mentioned in this booklet virtually constitute a new country without pioneer conditions, and the advantages of the pioneer are here without his privations. The farmer comes to a section of marvelous productiveness, whose markets are organized, but whose wealth of soil has not been developed, and he finds all other things much as in the State he leaves behind.
The Rocky Mount Mills, (Cotton) 30,000 Spindles.
WE HAVE spoken thus far only of the farmer. His is the bottom industry of society, and if a country is a good country for the man who tills the soil, raises fruit and supplies us with mutton, butter, eggs and milk, it is a good country for other people. The prosperous and permanent towns of Edgecombe and Nash counties, of which Rocky Mount is the trading center, must have back of them a well developed farming community. In this the writer can only say what he has already said about the other prosperous towns of this section of Eastern North Carolina—that it is a substantial and progressive town in which the spirit of enterprise is abroad, and whose citizens are not so much concerned about the advertisement of their exceptionally desirable and attractive features of life in Rocky Mount, but are mainly interested in the settlement of the idle lands of Nash and Edgecombe counties, because their occupation by practical farmers means the increased prosperity of Rocky Mount.
Rocky Mount has a population of approximately 14,000, a gain of about 400 per cent since 1900. The town is situated in Nash and Edgecombe counties. North Carolina, with railroad lines running in four different directions, affording splendid freight and passenger traffic facilities to the North and South.
It will be best to let the following facts regarding the growth and development of Rocky Mount speak for themselves. According to a little brochure now being issued by the Rocky Mount Chamber of Commerce, Rocky Mount is the terminal of six railroads, has thirty-eight passenger and eight freight trains daily, a tobacco market in which 13,500,000 pounds changed hands for a price of approximately $2,500,000, and in their cotton market 7,500 bales were sold, bringing $500,000. There are four banks, three theatres, three hospitals, two clubs, three hotels, modern Y. M. C. A., four graded and high schools. Situated upon the main line of the A. C. L., it also has the shops of this road giving employment to 3,000 workmen and trainmen and which distributes annually over $1,700,000. In addition to this enormous business, there are five tobacco factories, two cottonseed oil mills, two fertilizer factories, a perfectly equipped 30,000 spindle cotton mill, a hosiery mill, several lumber and woodworking plants, machine shop, mattress factory, two ice plants, including electric light and water works owned by the city. The total value of the industrial plants is estimated at $3,250,000; total annual output, $5,000,000; total number of hands employed, 5,000, with a total pay roll of over $3,300,000.
The main resources of Rocky Mount are, naturally, agriculture, and with the superb situation of the city in the center of one of the richest farming sections of the State, its future is positively assured. The city lies between the counties of Nash and Edgecombe, and is in the very center of the North Carolina territory
Farmers around Mount Olive have quit paying the “Mud Tax” and are building good Roads.
A Road out of Mount Olive.
known as the “Marlboro Strip,” the soil being a light loam over clay subsoil, the easiest land to cultivate and the richest in production in the United States.
The Secretary of the Rocky Mount Chamber of Commerce will, upon communication, furnish complete detailed information relating to his territory. They have recently issued a small booklet and those interested in the South would do well to send for it.
“GOOD ROADS” IS AN EASTERN NORTH CAROLINASLOGAN
Among the most significant mementoes handed down to us from the remotest periods in the history of our race is that of a correct appreciation of the importance of good roads, and in the construction of them. The direct effect of changing bad roads into good roads has (upon land values and the general economic welfare of a community) been learned by EASTERN NORTH CAROLINIANS in general, and they are rapidly changing their bad roads into good ones. In this section of the State roads of good character can be constructed and maintained at a lower cost than in any other section of the United States by reason of the peculiarities of the soil—in its perfect combination of clay and sandy loam.
In many counties of the State road building of a substantial character is going on constantly, and where done, the values of farm land bordering on the roads have increased to such an extent that the cost of road improvement is equalized, if not exceeded. As the roads in no way affect soil fertility or quality of the farm, advances are due essentially to the decrease in the cost of hauling produce to market or shipping point. Farms are now regarded as manufacturing plants for the business of farming, and any reduction in their profits through unnecessary heavy costs for hauling on bad roads naturally reduces their capitalization. With reduced cost for hauling, profits are increased, with the results that the farm plant shows satisfactory earnings on a higher capital value.
The automobile has also begun to be an important factor in increasing rural values where good roads have been introduced.
Where road conditions in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, especially apparent in the vicinity of Wilmington, have been made favorable, immigration of a desirable character has been particularly marked; in fact, the writer believes that good roads increase the demand for rural property, and the price of farm land, like that of any other commodity, is ruled by the relations between demand and supply. Land values are determined by the number of people that pass it every twenty-four hours—country and city property alike.
A small Piece of Land in Eastern North Carolina is the Path to Prosperity.
New Bern's Harbor and Water Front.
YOUR ATTENTION TO
Craven County.
NEW BERN demands that the homeseeker who may have his eye on the South to look at the agricultural side of the Newbern section of Craven County, and to investigate its agricultural productions and possibilities; to note the resources upon which the crops depend, the promises which farmers will find in the nature of things that are offered.
This section of Craven County needs more population for proper development. It wants the right kind of farmers. The people already in the county have proven what, with industry and brains, the farmer can do here in the variety of his efforts. The openings are here; there are all the gains of experience; the incoming homeseeker knows what to do and what can be done; there are established communities, transportation lines, schools, and organized markets and cheap lands—very cheap when the rich soil and favoring climate is considered.
Craven County farmers are adopting modern methods, and, in consequence they are becoming prosperous. The old idea of “all cotton” has gone, and with it the poverty and general slack-twistedness of our farms. Big red barns are being constructed, silos are being built and pure bred cattle placed upon the farms. Corn, tobacco, vegetables, oats, cow peas, clovers are now being grown by many Craven County farmers who have never heretofore attempted anything except cotton. Oats from fall plowing, and which are being harvested through beef stock, the residue plowed under to furnish green manure, is being tried by many farmers.
No further nor stronger testimony is necessary than what is given by Graham Richardson, John S. McGowan, J. A. Miller, Monroe Howell, F. L. Bray and Oliver H. Perry, who have all made a success at farming in the Newbern section. These gentlemen are all operating their farms upon a well-defined system of diversication, and, in consequence, have made money.
Newbern, with a population of about 15,000 inhabitants, lying at the juncture of two beautiful, deep rivers, the Neuse, one and one-quarter miles and the Trent, one-half mile wide, a peninsula in shape, is the center of the great cotton, lumber and agricultural belt of the South Atlantic seaboard. Its unlimited railroad and deep water facilities, the new inland waterway (12 feet deep) passing through the harbor, and railroads running into the city, across both rivers and from the inland in various directions, with ample sites for manufacturing industries, utilizing the raw material found here in great abundance, make this one of the most desirable cities in which to locate in the entire country.
One of New Bern's Business Streets.
Heavy draught steamers, foreign as well as domestic, can come to the very doors. As to railroad transportation there is double daily service in all directions, only one hour's ride to the mighty Atlantic, six hours to Norfolk, ten hours to Richmond and twenty hours to New York.
Newbern wants men with capital, interested in manufacturing enterprises, to investigate her raw material and start something.
Newbern has kept apace with the progress so prevalent in the South today. Over a million dollars have been expended here in a short period. Among the recent improvements are three churches, twenty-five miles of concrete sidewalks with granite curbing, and thirty-five blocks paved with vitrified brick, new factories, lumber mills, school buildings, handsome reinforced concrete blocks of five large stores and a number of modern brick stores, a new union passenger station and railroad shops. Newbern justly boasts of one of the best fish and oyster markets on the coast. Location is unsurpassed for manufacturing industries utilizing gum timber for veneered baskets, boxes or barrel staves, also, owing to the unlimited supply of timber and lumber, such as pine, gum, poplar, ash, cypress, oak, etc., able to supply the raw material for saw mills, box factories, veneered gum box factories, furniture, basket, sash, door and blind factories, and wood working plants for the manufacture of wagons, carriages, novelties, hames, wheelbarrows, trucks, laths, trunks, etc.
There are no less than sixteen lumber mills located around the city. In addition to these there are four fertilizer factories, two ice plants, large cotton oil mill and factories manufacturing agricultural implements, boxes, barrels and baskets, carriages, boilers and machinery.
Newbern has a wide-awake Chamber of Commerce, a very able and hustling secretary, who has the capacity of handling big problems, and has done much for Newbern in the way of encouraging the development of the unlimited resources of Craven County. Communication with the secretary of this organization will bring an immediate response with full details as regards the prices of land and locations.
PIGS, PEANUTS AND POULTRYThe best peanut soils in the world are situated within the Coastal Plain, extending from South Carolina far up into Virginia. This statement, coupled with the fact that just to the North in Virginia at Norfolk, Suffolk, Petersburg and Richmond, and there are several important markets in this State, so that the grower is always assured a cash market for quality products. Peanuts grown in combination with hogs and poultry, possibly, admit of quicker and better profits than any other combination upon the farm.
An Eastern North Carolina Wheat Field. Thirty Bushels to the Acre.
TO WEALTH
The section of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA treated in the booklet is one of the most desirable sections of the world for the production of ground fruits and vegetables, especially “out-of-season” products—vegetables and fruits ready for consumption at the very time when the Northern markets are lean. Strawberries of the very finest quality, when there are no strawberries in other markets. Cucumbers, onions, lettuce, asparagus, egg plant, radishes, spinach, squash, sugar corn, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, Irish potatoes, peppers, English peas, beans, beets, cabbage, cauliflower, and many other vegetables, make this the very ideal place for the hard-working, energetic farmer who would like to take up this phase of the agricultural industry as a money-crop.
There are multitudes of opportunities for the truck grower in this section, because a vast industry has already been developed here, having its beginning as far back as 1875. The exceptional transportation facilities which the ATLANTIC COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY has perfected for the safe and prompt delivery of all truck and small fruits to the great market centers of the country is a distinct advantage toward adopting this phase of the farming proposition.
There are four elements that are absolutely necessary before success comes to your efforts in vegetable growing: a rich soil, a climate that will allow you to produce and ship vegetables when other parts of the country are without them, markets that will take all you can raise at a good price, and intelligence and energy. Without the practice of intelligence and energy, you will never achieve success in vegetable growing in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA.
A SECTION WITH A FAVORING CLIMATEBuilders all come from a country that has weather as well as climate. On the Equator, where Nature is too lavish, man simply lies down and depends upon the Dame to tuck him in and shake the friendly branches so that fruit will fall within his reach. Where parents do too much for their children, the children will not do much for themselves. And when Mother Nature does too much for her family, the result is exactly the same.
It is not best to be coddled in the lap of Nature. EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA is no climatic coddler. It is an out-of-doors country. There is no protracted cold, and there is still escape from many of the ills born of the weather. There is a maximum of sunshine, a moderately cool summer, a reasonable wind velocity and a mild, aseptic, invigorating winter. The climate in this latitude is ideal, the most healthful and equable in the United States. Neither extreme
heat nor cold is known, and the highest temperatures, with but few exceptions, never go above 90 degrees, and not a single prostration from heat has ever been known.
The following table will show the average maintained throughout the year in temperatures, also the precipitation:
| MEAN TEMPERATURE | AVERAGE PRECIPITATION | |
| January | 43 | 1,94 |
| February | 44 | 2,63 |
| March | 56 | 1,66 |
| April | 62 | 2,84 |
| May | 67 | 5,81 |
| June | 73 | 6,92 |
| July | 79 | 4,13 |
| August | 77 | 5,67 |
| September | 73 | 5,98 |
| October | 65 | 4,12 |
| November | 47 | 1,49 |
| December | 42 | 2,63 |
This table is taken from the Government Reports for the past year, and it can be taken as authentic; very little change has been noted from these figures for many years past.
A GREAT SOURCE OF PROFIT ON THE FARMGet Your Garden Started
“God Almighty,” said Bacon, “made the first garden.” As man began life in a garden, he has been obliged to go back to gardens to find his life as well as his living. It is the vital relationship between the heart of man and the heart of Nature that gives true significance to that outdoor, open-breathing life which the man or woman who makes a garden must know.
It is from the garden that you must live, and the farm with a well-cultivated garden in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, and the farmer's wife who, with her individual canning outfit, provides the tables with vegetables during the periods of the year when Nature is dormant, is one of the greatest providers of the home.
Every settler coming into EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA should investigate the possibilities of canning fruits and vegetables, not only for his own table, but for those who do not produce anything—citizens of the nearby towns and cities. No section of the United States possesses greater favor of soil and climate for the development of fruit and vegetable growing as does EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA.
Starting Bulbs on May 1st at Magnolia, on Farm of H. E. Newberry, for shipment to Northern
Markets.
It has been successfully demonstrated that where good seed selection has been made, the land plowed deep and thoroughly cultivated, as high yields of corn can be made here as anywhere in the world. The soil and climate are just right for it, 235½ bushels having been produced upon a measured acre.
If intelligent methods of crop rotation are followed, so that corn will not follow corn, but some leguminous soil-building crop that has been grazed over and then plowed under, the Northern farmer can do better here twice over than upon his high-priced land up North, and have ample time to grow other crops on the same land as well.
GRASS IS IMMORTALThe inspired J. J. Ingalls said: “Forests decay, harvests perish, flowers vanish, but grass is immortal. It yields no fruit in earth or air, and yet, should its harvest fail for a single year, famine would depopulate the earth.”
This is an ideal country for the production of all kinds of hay and grasses. It is due to the fact that here we have an evenly distributed rainfall and longer growing season than is found in the States where grasses spring up naturally. Clovers of all kinds do exceedingly well and all legumes grow to perfection. But, like all other crops, the efforts to produce them depends upon the amount of labor backed by intelligence that is expended upon the effort. The possibilities for the production of hay for the Northern markets is practically unlimited. Alfalfa does well here, producing from four to six tons per acre.
THE POTATOWhen Eugene Grubb makes any observations regarding the potato, it is time for everybody to sit up and take notice. Grubb has been in the business of growing potatoes all his life and has made a great fortune at it—he knows. He says that many a farmer has been slow to grasp the wonderful opportunities of the Irish potato as a money-making crop. Its culture has been hap-hazard down here in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, the majority of farmers putting in but a small patch for their own use and attending to it only as they felt they could be spared from their cotton or tobacco. There is no earthly reason why the farmers of this section of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA should not devote a considerable portion of their land to the growing of Irish potatoes. These light, rich, sandy loam soils are ideally adapted for it, the climate permitting two crops.
If you must have mules, why not raise them at home. Eastern North Carolina can raise
mules at less cost than any place in the North. Some home-raised Harnett County Mules.
Harnett County.
EVERY lawmaker, whether in the State House at Raleigh, or in the city Hall at Dunn, N. C., realizes that the prosperity of the farmers of Harnett County is essential to the prosperity of Dunn. Every new farm economy practiced by our farmers is a help in the maintenance of Dunn's food supply. But the farmers of Harnett County themselves occupy independent ground. They are coddled individuals. The farmers in Harnett County cultivate the ground and everybody cultivates the farmers. They are the men who may skim the cream of life and have it for themselves. They are the men who may select the freshest eggs, fruits and vegetables for their meals, and they may so operate their farms, by reason of our superior climatic conditions, that their income is as steady the year round as that of the salaried man who lives in town.
The Harnett County farm is today a factory whose engines do not break down or wear out, which furnishes its own raw material and whose finished product is a net gain to the operator. In the crops that may be taken from the soil of Harnett County is a family income that is perpetual and is the one thing that may be depended on from year to year.
When we reflect that the home, safeguarded from want, is the main purpose of the efforts of all right-thinking men, it is the source of wonder to us who know, that any of these Harnett County lands should remain more than momentarily available.
The best time to establish your family in Harnett County is NOW, because it may be done most economically, and an additional benefit will be secured in the steady advance of land values.
Harnett County land will not produce any better crops than now, but more people will want it.
There are so many facilities or advantages which a farmer locating in Harnett County near Dunn will enjoy, and not the least among them are the superb transportation facilities, in both freight and passenger departments of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, to the great consuming markets of the country, and the next great advantage is the perfect educational facilities which the good citizens of Dunn have provided in their public school system.
Dunn is sending out a compelling invitation to farmers of other and less favored communities to settle in this vicinity, as the citizens of this town believe that the material advantages are superior to other sections of the United States which will bring greater benefits to the farmer settling here.
Dunn has a population of 3,100, is in Harnett County and is situated on the main line of the Atlantic Coast Line and Durham & Southern railroads, in the central
An Eastern North Carolina Herd of Pure Bred Aberdeen Angus Cattle.
part of the State, 40 miles south of Raleigh. It has electric lights, water works and sewerage; the water supply is from artesian wells. Its graded school is one of the best in the country. Nine churches, two large wholesale grocery houses and twelve manufacturing establishments are located within the corporate limits of the city.
Dunn is surrounded by some of the best agricultural lands in the State, which has contributed in making Dunn one of the best cotton markets in the South.
A card to Mr. Clarence J. Smith, Secretary of the Dunn, N. C., Chamber of Commerce, will bring an mmediate response with all specific information.
STOCK FARMING THE THINGStock farming is the thing for EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA—in fact, for the whole State. Why not? It has been demonstrated that alfalfa, Bermuda, cow peas, soy beans, clovers, lespedeza and all grasses can be grown in larger tonnage and with greater certainty than in any other State in the Union, and it has been further demonstrated that these feed stuffs have practically as much feed value as corn.
There never was a country where there was less disease, where decent and humane methods are followed in taking care of farm animals. The Tick eradication is now an assured success, and in a year or so the State of North Carolina will be entirely free from them. There is always an abundance of pure water. EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA wants the stock farmer, and to him who will adopt proper methods in handling his stock and select pure-bred varieties, there is an assured prosperity.
The live stock farmer who will come here and will grow a maximum acreage of feed stuffs and who will keep just enough live stock to consume that feed, and no more than he can give reasonable protection to during bad weather, and who returns to the soil the manure, is the farmer who will be prosperous.
It is generally the farmer who grows a crop and sells it, who takes from his soil and never returns anything, who is usually the one looking for cheap money and never finding it. It is the farmer who has well-kept stock who can borrow money if he needs it, but generally he is not in the borrowing class.
The farmer who, in addition to working his fields well and harvesting from the regular field crop, has a fair-sized herd of good dairy cows, harvests an extra crop from his land. Or, to put it in another way, adopting dairying as a side line, is equivalent to adding another field to his farm. Dairying is pre-eminently a side line for the cotton and corn farmer. It takes less from the land than any other branch of agriculture. A ton of butter is worth from $400 to $600, yet contains less than fifty cents worth of fertilizing elements. A bale of cotton sold represents over eight dollars worth of fertility taken from the farm.
‘Talk about Hog and Hominy” in the South. How's this for the hog?
A Few Mortgage Lifters.
The above tells but one side of the story. Dairying is profitable in direct returns—it is a spot cash business. There is always a good and steady market right here at home for all dairy products.
Sheep raising is an industry that should attract attention. Sixty-pound fat lambs are worth from $5 to $7 per head.
The demand for pure-bred steers is unlimited and the top price can always be secured, and the stockman can make good money raising and feeding them for the market.
Hogs can be produced for 2½ to 3 cents per pound. Only in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, where GREEN FEED CAN BE GROWN EVERY MONTH IN THE YEAR, is it possible to raise hogs so cheaply. If every farmer would raise a few high grade hogs and care for them properly, North Carolina would not only find it unnecessary to borrow money for her cotton crop, but would be in a position to loan it to other Southern States.
ROOT FOR THE HOGPigs Versus Cotton
Hogs possibly admit of the quickest realization of profit to be found in any branch of animal husbandry. Hogs can be raised in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA for three cents a pound. A litter of ten-months-old hogs that will average 175 pounds each are worth almost as much today as two bales of cotton. The market is practically right at your doors. The ATLANTIC COAST LINE takes your product of the hog farm right to the consuming centers of the United States. What is to prevent you, Mr. Man, from coming down here and going into the hog business? I don't mean to go at it in a hit-or-miss fashion, but to go into it right, as a serious money-making proposition. The conditions are just right for it. The proportion of a litter of ten-months-old pigs to two bales of cotton may be somewhat disarranged to some extent, but it is likely to be pretty near the figures which I am giving. Which will it cost the farmer more to produce—a bale of cotton, or six hogs? Which will leave his land in the best condition at the end of the year? Which proposition can be best handled with the labor at his command? Which of the two requires the greatest amount of capital?
Of course we are not recommending or even suggesting that EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA farmers, or those coming here in the future, shall abandon cotton as their principal money-making crop. This section is undoubtedly one of the banner cotton sections of the United States, and the world needs it. We must grow it. But the writer contends that pigs or live stock of any character, as a side line, is absolutely necessary as a principle of diversification. Another proposition presents itself to me, and that is, in times past it was considered enough
Cultivating “King Cotton” on a large scale near Fayetteville.
to say “Root, Hog, or Die,” but today, at least in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA, it is necessary to root for the hog to keep him from passing out of existence.
All farmers who do not come to EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA and raise pork are missing a magnificent opportunity. Hogs do not have to be milked, dehorned or branded, and if they are properly fed and given a warm, dry place in which to sleep they know enough to come home at nightfall. They yield from two to three hundred per cent profit under ordinary conditions; what they can be made to do under scientific or practical management is marvelous. Suppose you look into this, Mr. Farmer.
The grunt of the hog has a cheerful sound to the farmer, with the market around nine dollars a hundred weight. And many a man would break into the business if he knew how to make a go of it from the outset. Look into it. Look into it, anyway.
GROW COTTON, MR. NORTHERN FARMERAs Northern farmers have had no experience in growing cotton, they are not quite sure that it is a desirable crop to raise. Many of them have a false impression that it is a product grown only by the colored man. This is a great mistake. The labor of the cotton States for many years has been largely colored, and because the idea obtained throughout the North that cotton can only be successfully grown by negro labor, many farmers have hesitated to come here. Northern farmers who contemplate locating in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA should understand that cotton is the second largest crop in farm value produced in these United States. It is the one crop that the United States has practically a monopoly of. It naturally follows that new settlers going into this section of the South should grow cotton, not exclusivly ,but as one of several crops, raising as many acres as can be cultivated without going outside of the family for help.
Remember that there is a cash market for every pound grown.
OUR WATERS ABOUND IN FOOD FOR MANKINDFinned, Feathered, Furred
It is generally estimated that from the waters of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA there is taken annually five to six million dollars worth of fish—over forty species indigenous to this section—turtles, terrapin, soft and hard crabs, oysters, shrimps, frogs, water fowl, such as ducks, geese, brant and other species, which bring in thousands of dollars of revenue to the State, not to enumerate the large number of fur-bearing animals that are trapped here.
Portion of a 500-acre plantation owned by J. H. McIlwinen in Cumberland County. It will
average a bale and one-half to the acre.
MR. FARMER.
Fayetteville is Calling You.
MUCH depends upon surroundings. Health, happiness and prosperity often may be obtained by the RIGHT MOVE. Nature is your best Banker and Backer in Cumberland County, North Carolina. Cumberland County's natural conditions will assist you. Mr. Farmer, in obtaining the desired results, Come where the sun shines and the rain falls in season; where the surroundings are congenial; no destructive storms, extreme heat, cold or killing frosts, and where intelligent farming completes the chain, making it only a matter of how well a man does his part: It will be only good business judgment for the Northern farmer seeking a location in the South to take advantage of the natural advantages offered in Cumberland County.
Fayetteville, the county seat of Cumberland County, and for a short while in the early history of the State the Capital of North Carolina, is situated on the main line of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, 554 miles south of New York and 327 miles south of Washington, on the famous Coastal Plain, being about 120 miles from the Atlantic Coast. In addition to the main line of the Atlantic Coast Line, Fayetteville is served by the following railroad lines with their connections:
The Atlantic & Yadkin Branch of the A. C. L., from Wilmington to Sanford, where it connects with the Southern Railway for points in Western North Carolina.
The Bennettsville Branch of the A. C. L., from Fayetteville to Bennettsville. S. C., traversing a wonderful agricultural section, and affording a connection with the Seaboard Air Line at Maxton, N. C.
The Norfolk Southern Railroad, from Fayetteville to Raleigh, affording connections with the Southern, the main line of the Seaboard, and Durham & Southern Railroads.
The Aberdeen & Rockfish Railroad, from Fayetteville to Aberdeen, a practically new road opening up a wonderfully productive agricultural section, connecting with the main line of the S. A. L., and affording connections for the famous resorts of Pinehurst and Southern Pines.
The United States Government is spending $1,315,000.00 locking the Cape Fear River, on which this favored city is situated, which will give a minimum depth of eight feet from Fayetteville to Wilmington the year round. The first set of locks and dams is nearing completion; the second set will be completed about the mid-summer of 1915. This stream has formerly carried a heavy traffic in freights, but with the additional boating facilities guaranteed this river traffic is expected to grow to enormous proportions within a short time. The advantage of bringing
A Cumberland County Tobacco Field near Fayetteville.
heavy freights 140 miles inland at low water rates, to be easily distributed by rail, can easily be seen.
Favetteville is in the very midst of probably the greatest agricultural section on the American continent. Here all crops grow and mature equally well. Cotton is the principal crop, but tobacco is rapidly making a bid for a part of the laurels of the “Cotton King.” The shipping of cantaloupes and watermelons is a large and growing industry. Fayetteville melons commanding the highest prices on the Northern and Western markets, which are easily reached by refrigerator freights. Corn, oats, wheat and rye are other staple crops. The truck crops, particularly lettuce, beans, peaches, onions, asparagus and other vegetables are particularly fine.
Health and climatic conditions here are all that could be desired, drainage being perfect and the average yearly temperature being 64 degrees. Churches of all denominations, a splendid system of graded and high schools, a cultured and refined people, make of this an ideal home town.
Cotton factories, of which there are seven, and silk factories form the principal industrial enterprises.
Electric power in any quantity may be had at reasonable rates.
Desirable lands can be had at reasonable prices and the land and home seeker, looking for the combination which makes for health, happiness and prosperity, will find here opportunity in abundance and a welcome cordial and sincere.
TOBACCO BRINGS THE MONEYFor every pound of tobacco grown in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA there is a local market for it. Nearly all of the towns mentioned in this booklet have from one to two warehouses and several independent buyers.
The sandy loam soil of this section seems especially adapted to the growing of tobacco. Under favorable conditions from eight to fifteen hundred pounds is grown. Northern settlers find that they can grow and handle tobacco in every stage of production with as much ease as they did corn or any other crop, and that the returns per acre are more than it is possible to realize from the same character of crop in the North, as the climate down here permits the growing of two crops upon the same land.
DON'T FORGET THE CASH VALUE OF CLIMATE. EASTERNNORTH CAROLINA HAS A FAVORING CLIMATE.
The owner of this Sampson County herd has a “cinch.” No one can get his “goat” without
money. Mohair is climbing in price every day.
Sampson County.
WE ARE not concerned in making a catalogue of the civic virtues of Clinton, or to mention its “improvements.” A live town always has schools, churches, hotels, business blocks, water works and sewerage system, and if it is to grow in real power and greatness its setting is the important thing. What are the inevitable forces which are to build Clinton to a commanding position commercially? This is more important to Clinton and more important to the homeseeker than any elaboration of the “improvements” which the years have added.
“A free home for every family” is the American ideal. The natural unit of the family and the homestead is the condition of independence. It is the first acquired capital. The ambition of the normal American citizen is to own a home and a bit of land upon which it stands, and to pay toll to no man for the rooftree that shelters him. Especially does he aspire to own the land off which he feeds. My friends, why not look into the philosophy of the above statement and secure this home. If you already possess one way up there in the frozen North where you can only produce one crop each year, no matter how rich your soil may be, sell it and investigate carefully the claims of this wonderful country. The section of Sampson County around Clinton is prolific. It has just the kind of soil and climate that permits vegetable growth twelve months in the year. So I say to you, sell out your Northern farm and come to Clinton. Here is health in every breeze; here is life out of doors; here are flowers in the garden and the best climate on earth, Summer and Winter. A few miles distant the great Atlantic Ocean beats upon the most beautiful shore line in the world. Here is comfort and happiness and opportunity and work that pays, for you and yours.
This section is a natural agricultural region and already remarkable results have been obtained. Fruit raising, stock farming, dairying and general diversified farm operations have been attended with splendid results. Good water is easily obtained from wells at a depth of fifty feet.
Sampson County is the second county in the State in area and the nineteenth in population. Its lands are producing cotton, corn, tobacco, clovers, small grains, and truck of all kinds. Clinton, the county seat, is one of the largest green corn and huckleberry markets in the world; it is also a splendid market for bright tobaccos, and a great trucking center.
Clinton is situated on the Atlantic Coast Line, 68 miles from Wilmington, bearing north, and is thoroughly modern in every particular. Has splendid school facilities, electric lights, water works, seven churches, and two strong banks serving its 2,500 people.
Its Chamber of Commerce is a live organization that is anxious to furnish information and reasonable assistance to prospective homeseekers. Write the Secretary.
Strawberry Time in Eastern North Carolina. Picking the Fruit on W. E. Wilkinson's
Place near Mount Olive.
Wayne County.
WE LIVE,” says Emerson, “in a new and exceptional age. America is another name for opportunity. Our whole history appears like a last effort of Divine Providence in behalf of the human race.”
Emerson was right, America does mean “Opportunity.” North Carolina is in America, and Wayne County is in North Carolina, which means that this railroad and the business men of Mount Olive are attempting to direct your attention to Wayne County land. The biggest, safest, most profitable investment today is land in Wayne County, North Carolina—land which produces food. Wayne County is your real great opportunity. Come and see it and be convinced. By no means could we enumerate all of the crops that offer good prospects of financial success in Wayne County in the small space allotted here, but just enough to show the great diversity of farming that can be prosecuted on the soils of this favored section.
There are thousands of acres in Wayne County awaiting the man who has energy and knowledge of good farming, and to him there will be vouchsafed prosperity and hope fulfilled.
Wayne is another of the eastern tier of counties served by the Atlantic Coast Line that needs farmers—good farmers—and welcomes with open arms those who come for that purpose.
Mount Olive is about 70 miles north of Wilmington; just a short distance from the main line of the Atlantic Coast Line. It has a population of 2,500 and evinces a strong, progressive spirit among its people. Mount Olive is one of the greatest trucking centers in the South and this past season there was shipped from here 66,627 barrels of potatoes, 40,000 crates of strawberries, 20,000 crates of huckleberries, 11,000 baskets green beans, 30,000 crates cantaloupes, 813 cars of lumber, 302 cars barrels and crates, 2,000 packages of miscellaneous vegetables, 300,000 of leaf tobacco, 11,800 bales of cotton and 179 cars of cotton seed. No better advertisement, no better evidence of the remarkable versatility of Wayne County land, is needed than the foregoing statement of shipments from this station. Good schools in the town and county have been provided with an efficient educational system.
Mount Olive is a thoroughly progressive community, as is evidenced by the fact that the Chamber of Commerce with its fifty members is alive to any opportunity for the material advancement of the town or adjoining country. This organization will gladly furnish definite information regarding lands, locations and prices.
Write the Secretary of the Mount Olive Chamber of Commerce, Mount Olive, N. C.
With Wool Getting Higher every day, and Mutton around $14.00 a hundredweight, Sheep-
raising in the Burgaw Section of Pender County ought to look good to you, Mr. Farmer.
Pender County.
“IT is a sweet anthem,” he said, “when rendered by a gifted singer.” Bird gazing and bug hunting are pleasant and healthful occupations if you have the leisure and income to pursue them. But to inform a man who couldn't tell a pig-weed from a potato vine that he can come down here to Pender County and make a comfortable living for himself and family on a quarter of an acre is simply handing him a delusion and a snare. The exceptional man may do it—the ingenious, inventive, patient and highly intelligent man. Find me the exceptional man who has any need or desire to do it and you discover something that resembles the giraffe, concerning which the gentleman who had never seen one before remarked: ‘There ain't no such critter!’
As you may imagine I am not discounting the fertility of Pender County. We have lands in this county that will return more than a hundred dollars net an acre a year; we have other lands that don't produce one-tenth of that. Consider, three big factors: The land itself, the climate, and the man. There is nothing original in that statement, yet, trite as it may be, the city dweller who contemplates joining any little-lander movement had better ponder it. In the first place, he doesn't know anything about land; secondly, he is ignorant of the amount of work required to make the land produce; and thirdly, he is making a venture in which he does not know himself.
Pender County presents to the intelligent and energetic homeseeker great opportunities. Its day is now at hand. It has waited for certain economic changes to come about—for the working out of speculative farming methods and the passing of land monopolies, and Pender County is now ready for the best and highest uses—the only uses that can develop its resources—the cultivation of the soil by farmers who will live upon and own the soil they till. Under better methods of handling cotton lands, and with the coming of the general farm with its diversification, Pender County is to be one of the most prosperous and productive counties of Eastern North Carolina. Pender is one of the Eastern tier of counties lying along the Atlantic Coast, and its chief town. Burgaw, is almost in the center. Burgaw has a population of about 1,200 intelligent and progressive people, who are determined to make their town show the touch of progress in everything that goes to make a modern municipality.
The Atlantic Coast Line has three lines through the county, furnishing excellent transportation facilities, with Burgaw on the one that goes directly through the county north and south, only twenty-three miles from Wilmington.
There is plenty of land in all sections of the county at very reasonable prices. It is level and is susceptible of a very high state of cultivation.
For further information, address the Mayor of Burgaw or Secretary of the Burgaw Chamber of Commerce, Burgaw, Pender County. North Carolina.
High Schools at Chadbourn and Whiteville,—The Prudent Homeseeker will give thorough
heed to the educational facilities of Columbus County.
Columbus County.
BREAD and butter, for the most of us, constitutes the same problem as in all ages since Adam began in the sweat of his face to eat. More of a problem, indeed, in this day of complex civilization, than when we lived more simply. The unsubstantial attractions of the cities have been drawing our young men from the country for a century back. The centers of population have likewise caught and held too large a proportion of foreign immigrants.
Now, happily, the pendulum is swinging the other way. Bitter experience has taught hundreds of thousands their lesson. Men and women are weary of giving so much of their hard work for so little substance. They are coming belated to their better senses and yielding to the “call of the land.” To such, and to all who seek farming opportunity, the Chadbourn section of Columbus County offers practically the very cream of the United States in low-priced, fertile lands, equability of climate and congenial school conditions.
Come to Chadbourn, look around you, talk, ask questions, go out and see A. G. Marshall, who came here sixteen years ago from South Dakota; G. H. Thompson, from Colorado, and J. J. Hendren, a native of Western North Carolina. They will quickly convince you of the advantages and opportunities here.
Ask their advice and follow it. They know.
They will tell you that life for most of us is a struggle, and if you are going to farm at all, farm in Columbus County near Chadbourn, where the climate will help and not hinder; where comfort is of consequence; but the main thing is production, range of crops and length of growing season. We admit that the summers are hot, but the body of the year is delightful, and you will find there a great deal of satisfaction in seeing your pasture fields green in winter. Remember the value of climate. Water and wood are both abundant. Hog, sheep, cattle and goat raising are most attractive propositions for Columbus County.
One of the greatest advantages of Columbus County is the splendid system of rural schools that has been provided, No person with a family need hesitate in coming to Columbus County for reason of lack of educational facilities for their children. In quality and quantity in the towns and scattered throughout the county there are schools of a character unsurpassed anywhere in the United States.
Chadbourn had 242 people in 1900; this year its population exceeds 1,500. The banking, commercial, religious, educational and transportation facilities are especially favorable to the farmer.
Write the Mayor of Chadbourn for other specific information, or the Secretary of the Chamber of Commerce.
Eastern North Carolina Pigs Making Hogs of Themselves. Hogs can be made ready for the
market in Columbus County for three cents per pound.
Columbus County.
IT is good to see that the cry of “Back to the Farm” is being taken up by every class and kind of folk all over the United States. Doubling our acreage yield is bound to decrease the high cost of living. No one now alive need fear lacking for food if he works. The rewards of life are automatic. He who renders a service to society will receive a service in return; every good thing will be brought to his door, and there are enough good things to go around. The farmer is in partnership with Nature. Man is a manifestation of Nature. The more he understands Nature, loves Nature, and works in harmony with the direction of natural tendencies of soil and climate, the more contented and prosperous he will be.
Columbus County is a precocious country, and will produce abundantly all vegetable growth of the temperate zones. It don't mean that you can come down here and secure results at all commensurate with the wonderful possibilities of this soil and climatic conditions unless you combine brains with brawn in your operations. Whiteville is not asking economic dependents and soil-robbers to come to the Whiteville section of Columbus County, but it is holding out a strong invitation to good farmers—men with money and a sound knowledge of the principles and practices of good farming. Splendid advantages exist here.
Whiteville possesses a very intelligent citizenship, who realize that the time for development of this section is now, and for that reason this invitation to good farmers is being sent out. Columbus County is one of the best developed of the Eastern tier. Its school system, especially with reference to rural education, is equal in quality and volume to any section of the United States, North or South, and that fact in itself should commend this county very highly to those contemplating a removal to Eastern North Carolina.
Whiteville has a population of 1,800 and is the county seat of Columbus County. It is situated in almost the direct center of the county, 47 miles from Wilmington, on the Atlantic Coast Line.
Every line of human effort is well represented in Whiteville. There are two strong banks and a full complement of high class commercial establishments. The town is in about the center of the county and is about 30 miles from the seacoast, which guarantees a climatic favor with reference to health and vegetable growth.
Cotton, corn and tobacco are the staple crops, but splendid possibilities exist for the development of all kinds of farm operations, fruit growing and trucking.
Write the Secretary of Whiteville Commercial Club and he will give you definite and detailed information with reference to the location and price of lands.
Some Selected Corn from a Farm in the Vicinity of Elm City in Wilson County.
Wilson County.
ELM CITY is talking to you, Mr. Farmer. It wants you, and if you will take the trouble to come down here and investigate the Elm City section of Wilson County, on the main line of the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, it will get you. You have heard something of the wonderful resources of soil and climate of Eastern North Carolina, and you want to know more about it.
What you want are facts—just plain, hard facts. You want to know whether it is worth coming down to investigate. You are entitled to that much information before you pull up stakes and move down to Wilson County. The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad and the good citizens of Elm City had rather lose the man than to have the man come down to Wilson County and lose his money. That is the way both feel about it. We know that if you come here and make good you will want your old friends and relatives back home to share this prosperity with you. If you came here and failed you wouldn't be human if you didn't blame Wilson County for the failure. Now, what the railroad and the business men want is to help you get to a place where you can make a success, for they know that successful men make a successful county. Success is here in Wilson County for you. There are many men who have come down from the colder and older Northern States with very little money and now prosperous land-owners, but they have worked hard for every dollar of it. Some of them have come from offices and factories, ignorant of farming, but with sense enough to get information from those competent to give it and to learn. But, remember, farming in Paradise might have its drawbacks if a fellow didn't work his crops there and didn't learn to handle them according to local conditions; it stands to reason that his crops would fail even in Paradise. So we do not want you to think that failure is impossible in Wilson County, but we know it is improbable if you will do your part. And right here we will tell you why. In the first place, when you come into Wilson County you come into a county where climate permits the growing of from two to three crops on the same land each year, against one crop in the colder States up North. Two or three crops, properly handled, means two or three profits. In the second place, the climate, being so mild, fires are only needed about five months in the year. You don't have to buy such expensive clothing; you don't have to build such expensive barns and houses. In the third place, you can buy land at about one-third of what you pay for it in the North. In the fourth place, a bale of cotton and one hundred bushels of corn to the acre on this incomparably rich land can be made the common production by right methods.
Elm City, which is sending out this invitation, is situated in the northern part of Wilson County, on the main line of the A. C. L., about midway between Rocky Mount and Wilson. It is in the midst of an exceptionally rich farming section,
Craven County Cotton Field in Picking Time.
offering splendid possibilities to an intelligent and energetic class of farmers. Good lands, fine climate and excellent transportation facilities are only a few of the attractions of this section.
The population of Elm City is about 800. It has four churches, two banks full line of general stores and a fine graded school. Lands in this vicinity are especially adapted to cotton, corn, bright tobaccos and trucking. Write the Mayor or Agent of the A. C. L. for other information.
SOMETHING FOR EVERY FARMER, BUSINESS ANDPROFESSIONAL MAN TO THINK ABOUT
Down With the Single Crop
Progressive agriculture is necessarily aggressive agriculture, and the practice of this forbids any dog-in-the-manger policy by the practitioner. The production of any one staple crop, such as cotton, corn, tobacco, etc., sold off the farm results the gradual deterioration of the soil and a decrease in revenue from the crops. The ATLANTIC COAST LINE, the State and National Departments of Agriculture, are advocating diversified farming because it provides: First, a more economic and profitable division of labor throughout the year; second, a rotation of crops; third, a more certain and continuous income; fourth, more live stock; fifth, smaller farms; sixth, more people on the land; seventh, better roads, better schools, better social conditions; eighth, more intensive and profitable cultivation of the soil; ninth, constantly increasing productive capacity of the land; tenth, more and better farm homes.
The disadvantages of the single crop system of farming are: First, it demands an excessive amount of labor for a short period of time; second, it means a multiplication of weeds; third, the income is uncertain and comes only once a year, which leads logically to a credit system of business, a method both dangerous and unsatisfactory; fourth, it tends to the concentration of land into large holdings and, eventually, to a decrease in rural population; fifth; it makes no provision for the maintainance or increase of soil fertility; sixth, the history of agriculture indicates that it is only a question of time for any single crop system to bring disaster to the individual and the community practicing it. These are facts for every farmer, business man, professional man and railroad executive to think about who is interested in the development and the present and future prosperity of the State of North Carolina. It is the writer's wish that every farmer considering the change in location and who contemplates coming to EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA will thoroughly digest these principles.
THE COMMERCIAL HEN
Ideal Conditions for An Egg Farm
A handful of chickens in a back yard will never make an egg farm. And the man who is aiming to go into the poultry business as a bread and butter maker had better hit the thousand-layer mark right at the start. Nowhere in this country will you find conditions more ideal for poultry raising than in EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA. The mild climate, an abundance of green food easily obtained and the steady demand, means success to anyone who will go into it right, and apply that intelligent effort so necessary to success in any business. A good hen lays in a year from four to six times her own weight in eggs. It takes a strong, living machine to stand the strain of such an output. Every hen, young or old, lays in the spring. An old hen may draw her rations three times a day through the winter and not lay an egg, but when the leaves begin to come out, the grass starts, the air is warm and soft and the sunshine genial, that old hen lays every day. Spring conditions force hens to lay. Furnish spring conditionsDon't Forget the Hen. The goose that laid the golden egg was an American Hen, after all.
for nine months in the year, and if you keep the right kind of hens, taking proper care of them, they will lay steadily the year round. That is where the climate of EASTERN NORTH CAROLINA gets close to proper conditions for poultry raising.
Did you know that there are something like thirty-five grades of fresh-dressed poultry—chickens—sold on the New York market every day? Amazing, but it is a fact. On a chicken farm a chicken is a chicken, but in the market a chicken may be a broiler, a fryer, a roaster, or a good many other things, and the thirty-five grades sell at thirty-five different prices. So if you intend to go into the chicken business, look into this selling side of the business.
Ducks and geese are good money-makers down here and thrive splendidly along the water-courses, especially geese, as they live entirely by grazing.
“A Small Farm Well Tilled Keeps the Pocket Well Filled”—In Eastern North Carolina—TRY IT NOW.
EASTERNNORTH CAROLINAFOR THEFARMER
Atlantic Coast LineVIRGINIA--NORTH CAROLINA--SOUTH CAROLINA--ALABAMA--FLORIDA--GEORGIA
Atalantic Coast Line Company Logo
Issued byPassenger DepartmentAtlantic Coast LineThe Standard Railroad of the SouthWilmington, N.C.
