McLean County, Illinois - Chapter 15: Agriculture, 1924

A PRE-EMINENTLY AGRICULTURAL COUNTY - PIONEER METHODS - CHEAP LANDS - CORN, A CHIEF PRODUCT - LIVE STOCK - NEW ERA WITH THE COMING OF RAILROADS - GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY - DRAINAGE - IMPROVED IMPLEMENTS - TRACTORS - LAND VALUES - LIVE STOCK AND GRAIN - OTHER PRODUCTS.

From the very beginnings of its history, McLean County has been a pre-eminently agricultural region. Agriculture is the basis of its wealth, and what progress the county has made in an industrial way is related in no distant manner with the cultivation and improvement of the land. Blessed by nature with a soil which is adapted to the raising of large crops of various kinds of cereals, and making possible the raising of large herds of good stock by scientific methods of feeding the grain, these two sources of income for the farming population form the foundation on which is built the prosperity of the rural community and of the towns and cities to which they contribute.

Of course, the earliest settlers of the county had to live entirely by agriculture, and that of the crudest sort. Having built his log cabin on the edge of a protecting grove, the early settler next began to cultivate the soil around his home in the fashion which the facilities at his command would permit. Usually he had only a wooden plow, and with this it was difficult to break up the prairie sod. In fact, at times the breaking up of the soil in large patches became impossible, and the settler resorted to chopping a hole, dropping a few grains of corn into it, and then covering with his heel. This sort of cultivation resulted the first year in producing some little corn stalks, to be used as fodder for the cattle or horses which the farmer possessed; the second year in a limited crop of ear corn, and perhaps after that time the cultivation of the soil had progressed to the point where more considerable results might be realized. The first plows brought to this county were little more than wooden shovels, and the farmer had to stop his horse every few yards and clean off the earth from the moulding board in order to permit of progress of any kind. This being true, it was easy to see that no farmer could attempt the cultivation of any great area of land.

But as a compensation for the hard methods of cultivation which hindered the earlier form of land tillage, was the great open space of prairie land lying in thousands of acres between the groves and streams and beyond the small areas of cultivated tracts. Land had little or no value, and every newcomer could take all that he wanted, although quarter sections were most desired, as this was about the maximum acreage that an ordinary family could hope to cultivate or use. The open prairies were used as pasture lands for what stock the early settlers brought with them or acquired after they located here. The stock was allowed to roam at large in summer, and in winter it was fed such stuff as the farmer could produce in the form of fodder or ear corn until such time as he could drive his stock to the nearest market, which was in Peoria, or perhaps Galena, for Chicago did not figure as a stock market in the early years. The price per acre paid by the first settlers was $1.25 from the years 1832 until about ten years later. The first entries were in the immediate vicinity of the groves, for no one thought of entering land in the open prairies.

It was more than twenty years after the county was first settled before the railroads were built through this section. The early settlers therefore had no market for their produce and were forced to dispose of it at home, either by grinding their grain for family use or feeding to stock.

From the very first, corn became the chief product of McLean County farms. First, because it was the easiest grain crop for which to obtain seed; then, its cultivation was a simpler process than that of oats or wheat. True, some of the early settlers had little patches of wheat which they harvested by crude methods and hauled to market to have it ground for family use. The nearest mills were located along some stream, either Kickapoo creek or the Mackinaw river, while some farmers went as far as Peoria, or Wabash, Ind., to have their milling done.

The coming of the railroads, in the years 1850 to '60, opened up a new era for the agriculture of McLean County, for the railroads provided what had up to that time been missing, a way to get to market. When the roads were built, farmers could aspire to greater production of grains or cattle, for they could see a way to get their surplus to market and thus realize a cash income from their farms. The whole thought in those days was to get the most from the land, and it was not until 50 years later that the idea of paying back to the land some of the elements of its fertility which the crops had extracted from it began to be taught to the farmers. The importance of this compensation process is now universally known and acknowledged by the farmers of McLean County and of central Illinois.

As the population of the county increased, as the extent of cultivated lands grew apace, and when the railroads had come to furnish a highway to market, the values of farm lands began to increase more rapidly than had been thought possible prior to the introduction of these factors.

Before we go farther, it may be well to briefly mention the character of the soil of McLean County, which explains its agricultural production and the methods of its farmers. The government geological survey shows that what is called Marshall silt loam composes 574,000 acres of the Mc- Lean County area, or 77.5 per cent of the total area. Miami black clay loam composes 70,000 acres, or nearly 10 per cent; Miami silt loam is found on 58,300 acres, or 7.9 per cent; Kakaskia loam on 20,000 acres, or 2.7 per cent, and McLean silt loam on 17,984 acres, or 2.4 per cent.

Corn, oats and hay are the only crops grown upon the Marshall silt loam, which comprises so large a proportion of the surface of McLean County. Of these corn is the most important, and this fact gives rise to the saying so widely known that McLean County is the hub of the corn belt of the United States. There is no need to attempt a scientific essay on the composition of these varying types of soil. Sufficient to say that the Marshall silt loam is a remarkably uniform soil, considering its large area. The surface ranges from gently rolling to rolling, the crests of the most pronounced undulations being not over 20 feet above the intervening depressions. The main body of the soil of the county is well known as the "black soil," a term which formerly was supposed to mean inexhaustible fertility. But it has been proved by a half century of actual farming that the black soil cannot survive forever unless the elements of which it is robbed by cultivation shall at intervals be replaced.

With the many streams of varying size which flow through McLean County, the surface in general is adapted for natural drainage. But in spite of this fact it is true that in the early days large areas of undrained lands, known as swamp lands, existed. For the quarter of a century, from about 1880, the chief concern of the farmers of the county was to get their lands drained, and tiling grew to be a big business in those days. The large proportion of McLean County farm lands are now artificially drained by under-surface tiling. The drainage question is now a closed issue except in some remoter sections of the county which have been backward in agricultural development.

We have spoken of the crude implements with which the early farmer pursued his tasks. In the era succeeding the civil war, there was a wonderful development along these lines. Wooden plows went out of use, and improved makes of steel plows became common. Gang plows, or those with several blades instead of one, came into fashion. Then the riding plow, on which the farmer could sit and drive his team as they went across the field. Corn planters of a mechanical kind succeeded the old hand planters. Reaping machines came into use, and the old methods of threshing grain gave way to steam engines and immense "separators" which could take the grain from the straw at the rate of thousands of bushels per day. Wagons, too, were improved in size and make and capacity for hauling. With all these changes and betterments of implements, the size of the farms which one man could manage and cultivate constantly grew. And it also gave rise to the custom of tenant farming, where the owner of the land could live in a near-by village or distant city, while the actual farming was done by a man and his family who lived in a tenant house and performed the work for a stipulated proportion of the crops, or paid the owner a certain rate per acre in cash.

The values of farm lands had a gradual but steady increase during all the years from the close of the civil war until the time of the world war. Of course there were slumps in 1873 and following years, and again in 1893 and the few years succeeding, because the general business conditions of the country had suffered depression. Grain and stock raising continued to be the chief agricultural industries. Grain elevators sprung up at nearly every town in the county, and shipments went out from this county to all the markets, Chicago, St. Louis, Indianapolis, New Orleans, and even to Kansas City. The completion of the east and west railroads, the New York Central and the Lake Erie lines, through this county, opened up an outlet for grain to the east, which before had been lacking. This made competition serve a better turn for the farmers.

We can pass over some of the incidents of the agricultural progress of the county for the period from 1865 to 1900, and come on rapidly to the modern era of power farming. This period is of only about ten years' duration up to the present time.

Mechanical power succeeds horse power in many operations on the farm in the present day. It began with the introduction of the stationary machinery, such as the threshing machine, and the horse-drawn reaping machine. But then came the era of the automobile as a means of transportation, which was followed in its second decade by the general introduction of gasoline engines in the operations of 'plowing, cultivation of grains, handling of grain in the barns, power churning, and the operation of machine shops on a small scale on the farm.

What were called farm tractors marked the next step in this era of the development of mechanical power in farm work to succeed the use of horses. The manufacturers of motor cars for transportation developed a more heavily built machine with greater power and with huge flanged wheels for making its way over plowed fields or rough ground. This was the tractor. Behind it might be hitched a series of plows, two, three, four, or even as high as eight blades in one diagonal drag. The engine was propelled by gasoline in what is called technically an internal explosion engine.

About the year 1915 was held in Bloomington a national tractor demonstration, when scores of different types of farm power machines were here for a week and gave an exhibit of their work in fields east and south of the city. Another similar demonstration on even a larger scale was given the following year. These public exhibitions of the modern methods of farming on a large scale attracted perhaps the greatest crowds of people ever drawn together at a public event of any kind in McLean County. It was estimated that as high as 100,000 people attended the demonstrations during the week of the second year's tractor show. The affair was engineered by the Bloomington Association of Commerce, in co-operation with the farmers of the vicinity and of the county in general. On certain days a long line of different makes of tractors plowed parallel strips of a field which had been in oats stubble. The farmers were therefore able to compare the methods of the different makes of tractors. The net results of all this public show was to introduce scores of tractors on the farms of the county within the next year or two. Many farmers learned to run the machines who might not otherwise have had their attention called to them. It must be said that not every farmer who tried running a tractor made a success of it, some failing for various reasons. But on the whole, the era of power farming in this county can be dated from the great tractor demonstrations of 1915-16.

The World War period formed a distinct era for the farmers of this and other central Illinois counties. Under the urge of government agencies, the amount of food grains produced was increased by a large percentage. Prices, too, went up to heights that were undreamed of before, and a period of unusual prosperity seemed at hand for the farmers who carried on their work in a sensible manner.

Land values likewise arose to heights that had never before been reached, and farm lands in McLean County sold as high as $400 per acre and more in some instances. Many deals were made on that basis, and while some of those who handled high-priced lands lost by later deflation, those who could foresee the natural recession that must come did not stand to lose.

For two or three years after the world war saw the hardest period that farmers of McLean County have experienced in this generation. With the drop in prices of grains and stock, many of the farmers were unable to market their crops at a profit at all, inasmuch as they had paid inflated prices for labor and other factors which had entered into the production of their crops. Indeed, very serious losses stared in the face scores of farmers in the county. Values of land decreased in correspondence with the general drop of farm produce. But by the year 1922-23 it was thought that the low-water mark had been reached, and it is hoped and expected that a new era of farm prosperity is awaiting the land owners and tenants of this county who judiciously carry on their work. It cannot be expected to reach the high-water mark of war times, but the great slump of 1920-21 is definitely passed, and the scale is turning upward in the years 1923-24. Prices for farm lands as recorded in some of the March first deals for 1924 ranged from $200 to $300 per acre for land that is well situated and in good condition. Of course some tracts that are poorly located or have meager improvements sell for much less per acre.

From the last published annual report of Harrison Fahrnkopf, that of the year 1922-23, some interesting facts are gleaned about the agricultural resources of the county, as well as to the activities of the farm bureau, as follows:

"In the value of all farm property McLean is the second richest county in the United States. Los Angeles County, Cal., is the first, with a value of all farm property in 1920 of $396,915,164; McLean County is second, with a value of all farm property of $267,337,088.

In the value of crops harvested McLean County ranks as the seventh richest county in the United States - this is according to the figures for 1919. Los Angeles County, Cal., again is first, with a value of crops harvested in 1919, $62,212,843 ; McLean County is seventh, with a value of crops harvested in 1919 of $26,887,618.

"The counties of Los Angeles and San Joaquin and Tulare, Cal. ; the county of Aroostook, Me., the county of Lancaster, Pa., and the county of Whitman, Wash., are ahead of McLean County in the value of crops harvested for 1919."