Cass County, Indiana - Chapter 10: Agriculture and Horticulture, 1913

PiBST Farmer - Trials and Difficulties - Crude Implements - Progress - ^Modern Improvements - Agricultural Society - First Fair - Gardening - Green Houses - Horticulture - Dairy and Live Stock.

This is preeminently an agricultural county and the principal occupation of the majority of its people ; and the beginnings of agriculture dates back to the first permanent settlement of the county, about the year 1826. Although there were missionaries passing down the Wabash a half century before and some Indian traders located at the mouth of Eel river a few years prior to this date. Probably the first man to settle in the county and clear the native forest and cultivate the land, in other words, the pioneer agriculturist was William Newman. He entered the east half of the northeast qus^rter of section 33, township 27 north, range 1 east, situated about two miles west of Logansport, on the south bank of the Wabash river in Clinton township on Dec. 1, 1825, at the Crawfordsville land oflSce, but it was not until the spring of 1827 that he built his cabin, cleared the ground and planted his crop and probably the summer of 1827 saw the first fruits of the agriculturist, produced by the white man, within the bounds of Cass county.

William Newman, the county's first farmer, only remained four summers, when he sold out the pioneer farm to William Neflf, who occupied the place for many years.

As to the personal history of Mr. Newman, his pioneer experience in Cass county little is known, but Adam Porter, late of Carroll county, knew him in Marion county and says he was a man of generous impulses, possessing habits of industry although greatly enfeebled by long continued attacks of the ** Wabash shakes" or fever and ague, which was the principal cause of his removal. Mr. Porter speaks of an accidental meeting with his friend as follows: ''On making a trip through the Wabash country, who should I meet but my friend Newman and the last man I was thinking of. I was invited to his cabin and treated like a prince.'' Others speak of this pioneer agriculturist of Cass county in similar terms of commendation. This place, now owned by John Hedde, was the first improved farm within the limits of Cass county. Mr. Newman was soon followed by others and the next five or six years saw settlers locating in every township in the' county, chiseling farms out of the forests, sowing seed and planting orchards. Agriculture, however, was slow in developing in this section, because of the dense forests that had to be cut down and removed and the stumps that dotted the fields remained for nearly a generation, and were a great annoyance to the pioneer farmer, for be it remembered, djniamite, by which the farmer of today removes stumps, was uiiknown to the pioneers. Again, there were no markets and no inducements to raise anything beyond the requirements of the family. Stock, however, required but little provision for winter. Hay grew luxuriantly on the prairies and marshes and could be had for the cutting. The forest abounded in mast and shrubs where cattle and hogs could range almost the winter through, requiring but little from the crop raised by the farmer. The forests also abounded in game of many kinds and it was easier for the first agriculturist to supply the wants of his family wit^ the rifle or trap than with the plow. Farming implements were crude; the old wooden **moul-board plow*' or the **Jumpin '-shovel plow'' did little more than skim the surface of the ground and was difficult to manage on account of the clumsy make, so that the farmer did no more plowing than was necessary to insure enough wheat, corn and potatoes to carry him through to the next season. There was little encouragement to raise a surplus because in a country with neither wagon roads nor railroads there w^as practically no market. Logansport was only a village and but little demand for farm produce and the market outside of the county was wholly inaccessible, hence the pioneer farmers of Cass county simply supplied their own wants and spent their time in felling the forests and looking forward in the hope of a better day..

The wheat was sown broadcast by the hand, cut with a sickle, thrashed with a flail or tramped out by horses or oxen and winnowed in the wind. The grain being cleaned, was in the very early days ground in a hand mill or between slabs of stone, but soon the old water grist mill replaced the hand mill and the farmer would take his grain on horseback to the mill, probably ten or more miles distant, and wait his turn for his grist. Then came the laborious process of the pioneer mother of converting the flour or meal into bread in the day when stoves and ovens were unknown, when the bread was baked on the hearth of the fireplace or in an old cast-iron dutch oven covered with coals in the open fireplace.

For the first ten years after the settlement of Cass county the farmers almost entirely maintained themselves from what they raised on the farm and from the chase as there was no demand for their produce, no mills or factories in the county and difficult to purchase any goods even had they money, and the latter was as scarce as the mills. Thus the early agriculturist was left almost entirely to his own resources, but necessity made them resourceful and self-reliant. The good housewife would spin, weave, knit and make clothing for the family, often skins of animals would supply material for pants, coats, mittens and moccasins ; all household furniture and many farm implements, as rakes, hoes, plows, handles, etc., were improvised by the pioneer. These facts reveal at a glance that the pioneers were an independent class. The farm furnished the raw materiaJ and the home was the factory. What need had they for stores or woolen or cotton mills? In this primitive way the pioneer farmers began to develop Cass county, but when the Wabash and Erie canal was opened up for traffic in 1839, a new era began to dawn ; the farmer could ship his products to Toledo by canal boat and receive in return manufactured and other goods. There was an incentive to produce more th^n supplied his wants, better farm implements could be procured and better methods adopted. The sickle gave way to the grain cradle and the fanning mill was introduced, materially reducing the labor and expediting the harvesting and prepariilg the grain for the market. Flouring mills, sawmills, woolen and other factories were erected in different parts of the county ; new appliances and implements enabled the farmers to greatly increase their acreage and multiply the output at a saving of time and labor over former methods. The home became less a factory and the women, instead of being weavers of dress fabrics, became patrons of the town merchant for the goods that she had formerly made in the home. The farmer no longer relied on the wild grasses, the forest mast and browsing for live stock, but timothy, red top and clover began to be grown, crops became more diversified, stock-raising more profitable; a general change from pioneer methods and a gradual uplift. Whilst the canal produced a wonderful change and was hailed with rejoicing, yet the advent of the railroad in 1855 was a still greater boon to the farmers, and people generally of Cass county. This brought a quick and ready market for all agricultural products as it also supplied him in exchange for anything he needed or demanded. About this time new and greatly improved farm implements made their appearance, such as grain drills, reaping and mowing machines, hay rakes and forks, the **old caver'' for thrashing wheat, soon followed by the large thrashing machine separator, run by horse power. The building of railroads in all directions throughout the county has developed towns in nearly every township so that the farmer has a ready market at his door, where he can easily ship his livestock without driving them for miles over execrable roads on hoof. Improved live stock began to appear. Wide awake farmers began to realize that thoroughbreds were better and m.ore profitable than scrub stock, and today the Cass county farmer will make a nine or ten months' old hog weigh over two hundred pounds, when fifty years ago the ** razor breed" would require twice as long to develop the same weight. Similar advancement and improvements have been made in the breeds of sheep, cattle, horses and poultry. The farmer of today is also awake to the fact that there are many varieties of grains, grasses and vegetables, and it pays to plant the best, which he is doing, being aided therein by the government agricultural experiment stations and Purdue university.

The past third of a century has seen a marvelous change in the methods of farming in Cass county, and if Mr. Newman, the first farmer in the county in 1827, could return and see the transformation, he would certainly think he was in fairyland. Then, he made his own furniture and farm implements, planted his com by hand, hoed it or plowed it with a single shovel plow, cut his wheat with a sickle, flailed it out and winnowed it in the wind, etc. Now the steel riding plow and disk harrow prepares the ground, the grain drill or corn planter plants the seed, the riding cultivator tends the com, the binder or the com cutter cuts and binds the wheat or corn as the case may be; the thresher with a traction engine threshes his wheat and stacks the straw and the shredder husks his com and converts the fodder into hay for his stock, all performed by machinery. But we can't particularize, simply refer the reader to a well-stocked agricultural implement dealer in Logansport and see the great variety of all kinds of farm implements and labor-saving machines with which the farmer of today is surrounded. Compare these with the simple home-made tools of the pioneer farmer of eighty years ago, then say that the farmer of Cass county is not progressive. Take a drive through the country and notice the change since 1827. Then there was not an improved road in the county, the fences were worm-rail, the houses round log, or perchance a well to do farmer would have a hewed log house, not ti buggy or carriage and no use for one, as roads were not yet opened. Today you see the wire fence with cement posts, gravel or stone roads, fine modem houses, heated by a furnace, large, elegant barns and silos filled with hay, grain and shredded fodder, a tool house filled with farm implements that would tax the pioneers ingenuity to decipher their uses; take down the telephone and talk with a friend or summon a doctor miles away, and notice the farmer driving at a 25-mile gait in a machine that has no **pushee" or **pullee/' and then dispute the statement that Cass county farmers have progressed. Again, nearly every township in the county holds a semi-annual farmers' institute and the whole county meets annually in Logansport to interchange ideas and discuss the best methods of conducting a farm, improving the breeds of stock, the most profitable crops for certain soils, in fact, everything that pertains to farm life, both indoors and out! The agricultural department of the state and nation assist and encourage these institutes and often send out lecturers of great erudition on farm topics to instruct our farmers, and with the rural mail service, delivering daily mail to the farmer's door, keeps him well posted on all lines of knowledge, and today Cass county farming is carried on along scientific and practical lines. During the past thirty years the improvements in agricultural implements and machinery have been so numerous and of such vast importance that the manual labor required on the farm has been reduced to the lowest point ever- known. While large areas are cultivated and while scientific methods of culture has increased the product, yet the number of hands required to raise and harvest the crops is less, hence one cause for the trend of the population to the cities.

As a resume of the progress made by our farmers and the conveniences and luxuries they now enjoy, we will mention the telephone which reaches every neighborhood in Cass county, the interurban cars pass many farmers' doors, and every house is supplied with daily mail by the rural carriers, agricultural societies, domestic science instruction, the art of rural adornment, better district schools and township high schools and such social and^ educational influences as they bring; where the self-binder, the reaper and mower, the ri/iing plow, the steam thresher, gasoline engines, electric power and numerous other inventions and devices for reducing labor, houses fitted up with all modem improvements, - light, water, bath, sewerage, heat, etc. - with automobiles and rubber tired buggies, in which they can travel swiftly over stone or gravel roads to every part of the county, adding greatly to the ease, comfort and convenience of life, are in sharp contrast to the primitive existence and methods of cultivation known to the pioneer farmer of Cass county. We give the following statistical reports of farm produce in Cass county for the year 1910 :

The legislature early recognized the agricultural interests of the state and recommended the organization of societies to that end. Pursuant to the provision of the law enacted in 1834, a meeting was held in the old seminary May 30, 1835, and the matter was discussed, but no action taken and the only result of the meeting was an awakening of an interest in the advantages of an agricultural association. There were a few advanced thinkers on the the subject of scientific farming, but the majority of the farmers did not believe that the quantity or quality of farm products could be improved beyond the experience of their fathers and nothing came of the first effort at organization. However, in September, 1840, the county commissioners appropriated $25.00 to encourage and assist the organization of an agricultural society and the following year or the beginning of 1842, steps were taken to perfect an organization, and H. L. Thomas was made president and Dr. John Lytic, secretary and James Horney, treasurer, and on the first Saturday in January, 1842, a premium list was arranged and published in the Logansport Telegraph, February 26, 1842, for the first Cass county fair to be held the following September. We copy some of the articles therein mentioned. After offering various premiums for the best stock, grains and vegetables, we note that a premium was offered for the best ten yards of jeans, best ten yards of home-made fulled cloth, best pair yarn socks, best pair of yarn mittens, best saddle made in the county and best piece of home-made furniture. In the fall of 1842, this, the first agricultural fair was held on the west side of Second street, where St. Joseph's Catholic school is now located There was a fine display of all kinds of agricultural products and homemade articles. Burl Booth relates an amusing incident connected with this fair. He was then a boy of ten summers and had a fat pig he exhibited. In driving this pig to the grounds, he had to cross the overhead canal bridge, that then spanned the canal on Broadway, and his pig became stubborn and jumped off the bridge into the canal, and boy-like, he began to boo-hoo, as he expected his pig would be drowned in the murky waters of the raging canal that ran through Fifth street; but to his great delight his pigship took to water like a duck, and soon was safe on the other side, washed and perfectly clean ready for the exhibit and he attributes his success at the fair to this incident and he captured the prize of fifty cents in silver coin, and the proudest boy in Hoosierdom. While there was quite a display of products of the farm and home-made articles and considerable interest manifested, yet the numbers who were active were too few, and the fair was not repeated for many years. The society was reorganized in 1854-5 and held several fairs in the east end on ground leased of George T. Tipton, and about 1860 grounds were leased and improved on the east side of Michigan avenue, south of Honey creek, where annual fairs were held for a number of years, but interest again waned, and the society became extinct or dormant until April 26, 1873, the Cass County Agricultural & Horticultural Association was formed with a capital stock of $20,000 to be divided into shares of $25.00 each. The purpose, as set forth in the articles of association was **to promote and improve agriculture, horticulture, the mechanic, manufacturing and household arts throughout Cass county ; and to this end to buy, sell and deal generally in such real and personal estate as miay be necessary to the successful prosecution of said business.''

A tract of land in the northeast quarter of section 29, township 27, north range 2, east, situated east of the city, now comprising Spencer park, was purchased as a fair ground. The necessary buildings were soon after erected and the grounds enclosed with a high board fence and the first fair was held on these grounds from September 9-13, 1873. J. G. Seybold, James Buchanan, W. D. Pratt, D. W, Tomliuson, J. W. Markley, G, W. Haigh and others were the prime movers in the organization, and successful county fairs were held annually for fifteen or twenty years, when interest began to lag ; other and larger expositions in nearby metropolitan cities so eclipsed the local fair that it again became dormant and finally disbanded, although in its day it was productive of much good by creating a spirit of rivalry among farmers,

With the rapid increase in the population of Logansport, creating a local demand for garden and vegetables and also the quick and easy shipment of the same to larger cities, market gardening has been greatly developed in and around our city within the past ten years to meet this increased demand and of recent years has become quite an industry. This industry is not carried on only in the summer season as formerly, but the *' greenhouse'' has made it possible to produce the ordinary garden vegetables the year round so that our people are now supplied with fresh vegetables at reasonable prices every day in the year.

The first vegetable greenhouse, steam heated, in Cass county was erected in 1906 on the north side by Charles F. Markert. His plant occupies 7,500 square feet of ground, enclosed in glass, heated by hot water, so that a summer temperature can be maintained in zero weather, thus supplying the city and surrounding towns with perennial fresh vegetables. The same or following year Keisling & Sons erected a similar vegetable greenhouse on the west side and this new industry reminds one of winter in Florida, were it not for the snow and sleigh bells outside.

If our good pioneer mothers could return and eat a Christmas dinner with us today, with the table supplied with fresh lettuce, radishes and tomatoes, they would certainly open their eyes in wonderment, but our farmers are ** progressives'' and can transform the frigid zone into a temperature or tropical climate and make the earth yield up its treasures of summer fruits and vegetables all times in the year.

The soil and climate of Cass county was early found to be well adapted to fruit culture and we find the pioneer farmer setting out orchards of apple, pear, peach and cherry trees with some of the small fruits as soon as the forests could be felled and the ground prepared. Possibly John Fidler, who settled in Miami township, near Lewisburg in 1830 or '31, was the first to set out fruit trees and start a nursery in the county. It is known that Henry Kreider, of Bethlehem township, as early as the fall of 1837 or spring of '38 purchased apple trees at the Fidler nursery. In the early settlement of the county there was an abundance of wild fruit such as plums, grapes, blackberries, huckleberries and strawberries, which furnished the settlers wath fruit until their orchards could be grown, but it was the custom of the pioneer to bring with him a bag" of all kinds of seeds, including those of fruits, and to plant the same as soon as a little clearing could be made around his cabin. These were, however, seedling trees and the fruit was at first of an inferior character until later years, grafting, budding and other methods of improving the quality of the fruit was introduced. For many years after the orchards had become bearing there was an abundance of peaches, pears and apples, but there was no demand outside the home market and our farmers only raised suflScient for domestic use and often the fruit would rot in the orchard ungathered.. In later years, however, when the forests were cut down, there came a change in climatic conditions. Severe winters or late spring frosts affected the orchards unfavorably. Fruit failures becaine frequent. Fruit growers came to regard horticulture as an uncertain occupation. Then came the horde of insect pests and fungi which damaged the fruit or destroyed the trees. This was owing somewhat to the extermination of the birds by clearing the forests and breaking up their habitat and also by sportsmen and hunters. As birds decreased, insects increased. The result was that orchards were neglected or allowed to die. Farmers being discouraged did not set out new orchards. Fruit growing became only a side issue and only enough for home consumption was attempted, until within recent years more attention has been paid to horticulture. Our cities have rapidly developed, creating a greater demand, shipping facilities have been greatly improved with new methods of preservation of fresh fruits by various processes of refrigeration, new scientific processes of spraying trees and killing insect pests ; grafting, budding, pruning, cultivating and mulching trees and retarding early spring budding until late frosts are past, have all tended to the rapid development of horticulture in Cass county within the past fifteen years, until we have many fine orchards of apples, peaches, pears, cherries and plums with acres of small fruits and berries which not only supply the local demand but some of our fruit growers, notably the Flory Bros, and J. M. Cantley, ship out large quantities to outside cities. These conditions are brought about and horticulture made a success, however, by orchardists waging incessant war against diseases that afflict fruit trees and the insect pests that prey upon them greatly atded by the scientific experimental stations of the state and nation with which our farmers are in close touch by means of daily free rural delivery of mail and by a closer relationship and interchange of ideas and experiences by the facilities afforded by farmers* institutes and associations that have been organized in recent years, thus placing farming and fruit culture on a scientific basis.

A company has been recently organized in Logansport for the purpose of selling pumps and spraying material to farmers for pruning fruit and shade trees, spraying the same and caring for orchards on the shares and practically instructing horticulturists how to care for orchards and make them productive of good and marketable fruit.

David N. Flory, Sr., of Miami township, was probably the pioneer in grafting and budding the more improved varieties of fruit upon seedling trees, until this process has become quite general and has been the means of greatly improving the quality as well as bringing new varieties into being. The banana-apple originated in this way and has become world famous. To call it a ** winter maiden blush'' would accurately describe it.

The first small fruit grower in a commercial way was the late J. A. Cantley, of Clinton township, who came from Hendricks county in 1866. He produced a superior berry, marketed them in wooden buckets, but later in trays at a uniform price of twenty cents per quart.

The business of small fruit growing that started in 1866 with onehalf acre has developed until hundreds of acres are now occupied with this industry. Crates and boxes are brought by the car load and today fruit is shipped from Cass county to many of the surrounding cities. L. B. Custer was also a pioneer nurseryman and did much to improve and develop the industry.

The first horticultural society in the state was organized in October, 1843, at Indianapolis with Henry Ward Beecher as its secretary, but this society had a precarious existence and ceased to exist. In 1860 the Indiana Horticultural Society was organized with Reuben Regan as its first president and William M. Loomis, secretary, and has kept up its organization to the present time with increasing interest and efficiency.

The Cass County Horticultural Society was organized in Library hall, Logansport, March 11, 1911, with thirty-five charter members and a present membership of 121, all parts of the county being represented. The officers are: A. E. Flory, president; L. B. Custer, vice-president; Slate Kline, secretary; executive committee, W. P. Martin, Robert Barnett and B. F. Campbell. The society has held frequent meetings, which have been addressed by eminent entomologists and professors from Purdue Agricultural College and December 9, 1911, Ex-Vice-President Fairbanks addressed the meeting. All of these men spoke on scientific and practical subjects of vital interest to the farmer and of special interest to the fruit grower, touching on the best varieties of fruit, methods of planting, cultivation, mulching and spraying of trees to kill and prevent the ravages of the San Jose scale and other insect pests, the bane of the modem horticulturist.

The society is an active working body and the interchange of experiences among its members with occasional addresses by scientific investigators has had a decided infiuence among our horticulturists as shown in the better grades and increased output of all kinds of fruits.

Cass county is not a distinctively dairy district ; our farmers in the development of the county only produced suflScient dairy products for home consumption; but with increased demand for milk and butter, by our growing ^ urban population, our farmers have in recent years begun to develop this industry and there are many dairy farms in different sections of the county supplied with modern dairy machinery for separating the cream and manufacturing butter. It has become a profitable industry and each year finds more of the farmers engaging in the business, and thus diversifying the farm products with mutual advantage to all concerned. Some dairymen separate the cream, utilize the skimmed milk by feeding it to their calves and hogs ; others sell the milk to the central dairy, but in either case butter is seldom made by the old method of souring the milk before taking the cream. The old has given way to the new process of separating the cream at once, while the milk is fresh, thus yielding a larger per cent of cream and leaving your skim milk sweet for other purposes. The pioneer milk crock or pan for the gradual rising and separation of the cream, long rows of which could he seen at the spring house, has gone to keep company with the sickle and the flail.

Almost the entire acreage of Cass county is under cultivation, there being only a small proportion of waste land. The agricultural interests are so diversified that the acreage devoted to any one industry is not as large as in some counties where farming is confined to a single staple crop, but this diversity of crops makes our farmers more independent, as they do not rely on any one product.