Okanogan County, Washington - Chapter 4: Descriptive, 1904

With the single exception of Yakima, Okanogan is the largest county in the state of Washington. The area of the former is 5,784, of the latter, 5,318, a difference of only 466 square miles. Previous to the setting off of Chelan, to the southwest, Okanogan county contained upwards of 8,000 square miles, a territory rivalling in size many of the most prominent states in the union. The present limits of the county are comprised within the International boundary on the north ; the Columbia river on the south ; Ferry county on the east ; Whatcom county on the west, and the recently organized county of Chelan on the southwest.

The Chelan-Okanogan boundary is a line from the extreme northeastern portion of Skagit county, nearly due southeast, to a point on the Columbia river a few miles below Pateros, in Okanogan county.

The Okanogan river, heading in Osoyoos lake, on the International boundary, trends southward, forming a confluence with the Columbia at Brewster, and dividing the county of Okanogan into two nearly equal portions, the western part being somewhat the larger. The territory throughout is traversed by innumerable streams and indented by beautiful lakes, many of the latter lying at high altitudes among the basins formed by depressions in mountain peaks. Of these picturesque bodies of water, Omak lake is the most extensive, lying to the east of the Okanogan river among the Bunch Grass hills of the Indian reservation. Among the mountains of the far northwest heads the Methow river, the general trend of which is southeasterly, joining the Columbia at Pateros. This stream flows through the finest agricultural lands in Washington, leaving the rich Okanogan mining district to the left on its course to join the Columbia.

In contour the entire country is decidedly mountainous. A non-technical classification of the land of Okanogan county would be mineral, timber, grazing and agricultural ; all of these sources are rapidly increasing ones, and of vast wealth in the aggregate. Although the surface of the country presents a rugged mountainous aspect, difficulties usually encountered in mountain traveling are not particularly unpleasant, there being low passes through almost all sections, making the problem of road construction a comparatively easy one. While the country is thus broken into bold and frowning foothills, a great many productive ranches nestle along the bench lands and in the \alleys of the streams. The problem of transportation by rail is the only serious one remaining tu Ije solved by a class of progressive citizens representing mining, lumbering, stock-raising and diversified agricultural industries.

No one general statement can satisfactorily cover the question of soil elements in Okanogan county. The most familiar character is sandy. Under favorable cultivation it is found arable and generously productive. The climate includes a variety of temperatures. It is in this matter that individual taste must be consulted. While climatic conditions vary with the great range of altitude, extremes during either summer or winter are not considered excessive. The climate of Okanogan county cannot be justly called dry, in the sense that this term is applied to other sections of the country, for summer showers are of frequent occurrence, and the snowfall is about normal for these latitudes. However, the highest degree of productiveness of land is gained by irrigation. Yet it is equally true that productive possibilities are fairly good from land inaccessible to artificial irrigation.

A graphic description of Okanogan county, thought it be drawn ever so vividly, fails to convey to a reader exactly the desired impression. There is no sameness of scenery ; everywhere it is varied, although its general effect is grand and imposing. Perhaps one of the most favorable stage routes - and at present there is nothing in the line of passenger transportation save stages and the short strip of summer river travel up the Okanogan from Brewster to Riverside - is from Republic through Wauconda, Bodie, Chesaw, INIolson, Oroville. Loomis, and southward to Conconully. the capital of the county. This route may be varied by including in the itinerary. Bolster and Kipling, of which descriptions are elsewhere given. It was the fortune of the writer to make the first mentioned succession of stages in the middle of winter previous to the holidays of 1903.

is not crossed within a distance of between fifteen and eighteen miles. The roads were found to be exceptionally good, the air invigorating and the grades, as a rule, easy, although to gain this possibility, it became necessary at times to pass over many devious and winding convolutions. It is well to recall the fact that in the matter of road-building the commissioners of the northern tier of counties in Washington expend considerable sums of money and that, too, judiciously and to the entire satisfaction of a large majority of the tax-payers. Owing to the absence of rail transportation the necessity for this will be readily perceived.

One of the most lovely portions of the drive between Republic and Chesaw passes through Lost Canyon, a sombre mountain gorge, heavily timbered with stately pines and firs, a few miles southeast of Chesaw. The present time of stage arrival at this point is about six o'clock p. m., and one has then been on the road from Republic nearly eleven hours, including a wait of an hour at Bodie for lunch. Most of the Okanogan traveling is by easy stages, and the drive from Chesaw to Oroville, on the Okonagan river, occupied a fair portion of the following day, with lunch at an elegant, large hotel - an innovation in the wilderness - at Molson. This route between Chesaw and Oroville is not so picturesque, perhaps, as the one between Republic and Chesaw, from a scenic view point, yet it includes sufficient exhilarating variety to satisfy the most ardent admirer of Dame Nature. On this route Mt. Bonaparte, one of the highest altitudes in Okanogan county, is left to the south. The town of "Oro," as the name is generally abbreviated, lies at the base and to the east of Mt. Ellemeham, at the confluence of the Similkameen and Okanogan rivers.

Six miles west of Chesaw, on the state road to Oro, is a rugged pile known as the "Hee Hee Stone." It is a large upright boulder, somewhat in the shape of the human body, and is the object of worship among the Indians. There are many stories concerning this stone,

Many years ago there were two rival tribes of Indians in this part of the country ; one on the Okanogan and the other on the banks of Meyers creek. These two tribes were continually at war with one another, like the Capulets and Montagues, and during the course of a desperate battle the chief of the Okanogan tribe was captured. The handsome daughter of the chief of the Meyers Creek tribe nursed him through a dangerous illness, with the usual, but romantic result. They fell in love with each other and determined to elope. The chief of the Okanogans, praying to the Great Spirit, had a vision in which it was revealed that they would escape and be happy providing the princess did not look back. But, woman-like, after she thought they were safe on the way, she did look back, and laughed, whereat she was turned into stone for her disobedience.

From that period, the legend runs, a legend combining the elements of Lot's wife and Romeo and Juliet, the Indians have never ceased to worship this rock, invariably leaving something upon it as they pass by. At present it is strewn with a motley array of old clothes, silk handkerchiefs, leather straps, small pieces of money, arrow heads, etc.

There is, however, still another version of the story of this mythical monument in the wilderness. It is one, too, having a wild, superstitious strain quite frequently observed in Indian folk-lore. This version was related by a youthful red man to the editor of the Meyers Creek Ncivs. The Indian prefaced his story with the observation that there were many traditions concerning the Hee Hee Stone, but he could contribute but one. He said :

"That story of an Indian chieftan watching a battle l:)etween Mt. Chapacca and Mt. Baldy while he was standing on the Hee Hee Stone, and about his laughing when Mt. Baldy crushed in the sides of Mt. Chapacca is all nonsense. So is the story of the long fight between two tribes during which an Indian maiden was captured fr(jni the Nez Perces, who, on looking toward the home of her people, to the east, against the commands of her captors, was turned into the rock which is now the Hee Hee Stone. Those stories are only repeated among white men and Chinamen. I will give you the true story :

"The Siwashes (generic term for all Indians) have always lived here. We were chasing deer in the Okanogan country long before your Adam was introduced to his Kloocth, (Eve) and were happy on these hills and in these valleys hundreds of years before any Chinamen ever lived. Along about the time Chief Abraham started up in business in Western Asia the Indians along the Okanogan became afflicted with some distemper, not unlike leprosy, and it threatened to destroy the whole nation. The priest of the Siwashes talked everv day with the Great Spirit who told him to tell his children that he would send a messenger to talk to them, and that on a certain day all the people should gather at the place named to receive the courier of the skies. The place designated was the same stone which is so reverenced by us. On the day appointed the Siwashes. for hundreds of miles were gathered here, all arrayed in the newest buckskins, and all, of course, anxious to see whether or not the priest, who was, also the medicine man, had told the truth or was only dreaming. At ten o'clock in the morning the priest pointed toward Mt. Bonaparte and thousands of eyes looked in tliat direction. Soon an object apl)eared in tiie southern skies which assumed the f'lrni of an angel, and before the astonished Siwashes could fall upon their faces the liea\enly visitor had alighted on the Hee Hee Stone.

"She was radiantly l^eautiful and immediately began to talk to the afflicted people. She told them that their cry for help had been heard bv the Great Spirit and that she had come to iielp them. She invited all who were suffering from the epidemic to come near her and l)e healed. Within a short time the army of invalids was transformed into a host of shouting Siwashes, exulting in the perfect health that had been given them. Their benefactress explained to them that siie would come again sometime, but that they must use the means that she would provide if they desired to retain their good health which she had given them. She then distributed camas seed among them and urged that they be planted everywhere, the roots of which when eaten would prevent a return of the malady from which they had suffered. She bade them be of good cheer, to deal justly with one another, and that some time she would come again.

"While the shouts that greeted this announcement were echoing over these hills, she was caught up in the air and floated away in the southern skies whence she came, and e\'er since she has been known to the Siwashes as Queen Camas, the divine visitor from the sky that healed our people. Now, is it a wonder, white man, that the pious Siwashes for thousands of years have drawn nigh this rock and have left upon it those tokens of affection that you always see exhibited there? When they are left there the act and gift are in memory of the beautiful Queen Camas who came and saved our people, and some time she will come to us again."

Seven o'clock on a raw December morning may be considered an inauspicious hour at which to begin a twenty-mile drive to Loomis. But on the whole it was exhilerating - and the walking was good. For there are heavy grades in the foot-hills of Mt. EUameham, which must be surmounted pedestrianwise or endure the pangs of witnessing the palpable agonies of a pair of jack-rabbit cayuses struggling with the almost impossible.

The driver, who has been delayed somewhat overtime, peremptorily announces that those who are going with him must be ready to depart. Trunks and other impedimenta are left behind to follow the next trip, a stinging whiplash cnrls through the air, and the '"stage," an uncovered hack of limited proportions, dashes a mile down grade to the east bank of the Similkameen river. Here is a ferry; the stream swollen bank full and running with ice. The hack-full of passengers rolls on to the Ijoat; a couple of miners mounted on cayuses ; an Indian "buck" clothed in fringed leggins and a ^lackinaw in colors of brilliant and startling design ; an Indian boy whose ears are tied up in a blue, polka-dot handkerchief, drift on to the boat in the rear of the "stage." An old man of Homeric visage - an animated Rembrandtain Charon - cjuietly informs us that we must "help work the craft across stream," with the added ominous suggestion that we "will be in luck if we get over at all with so much drift ice in the river." Following this admonition everyone, including the Indian boy, and excluding the Mackinawed Siwash, bears a hand, and the passage of the Similkameen is made in safety.

Two miles beyond, after a humming ride along the frozen bottom lands of the river, mountain climbing recommences. The scenery is rugged, sublime, yet constantly varying in contour and topographical presentation. We toil laboriously over one precipitous height to be confronted with another of sharper declivity. The road, a passably good one, winds a serpentine course nearly the entire distance between Oroville and Loomis, accentuated with abrupt curves at which one wonders what would occur should another vehicle be encountered in these wild and awesome passes. In the foot-hills one continually hovers between sunrise and sunset. There are points in the valleys, gulches and canyons where the sun, during the shortest days of winter, never rises. A cold Wind sweeps over the lower levels, as though pneumatically sucked through the canyons; higher and along the mountain sides the atmosphere is milder.

its pastoral beauty - twin lakes hung high in the mountain fastnesses, one on either side of the roadway. They are small, nearly circular, the larger one perhaps half a mile in diameter, and both of them animated by the presence of hundreds of wild ducks. A few miles further on and we gain the charming banks of Lake Wanicutt, a much larger body of water from whose margin rise huge, rocky mountains, nearly sheer and vertical from the broad level of this sylvan lake. Here, about midway the length of the lake, is the little hamlet of Golden, with a telephone office, and a few scattering picturesque homes. Leaving Golden, at one period a town of no little importance so far as commercial activity is concerned, but now retired from active competition with villages once in its class, the smooth roadway follows the north bank of Spectacle lake, so called from the resemblance of its meandering to a pair of eye-glasses. In reality these are two small o\'al lakes connected by a stream of water, the whole about two miles in length. From the western end of Spectacle lake it is only a short dash into the brisk and enterprising camp of "Loomis-On-The-Sinlahekin."

And now we are in the heart of the Palmer Mountain mining district, perhaps the most famous throughout the entire length and breadth of Okanogan county. Of this portion of the country Mr. L. K. Hodges has written in his exhaustive work, "Mining in the Pacific Nortlm'cst."

"Palmer Mountain is a great broad ridge, ten miles long from north to south and about six miles across, with numerous small peaks marked by cliffs of white dolomite. The formation of the mountain is diorite on the southern slope, extending as far as the summit, and on the northern portion this is intersected by dikes of black slate and serpentine. The eastern portion consists of slate capped with dolomite, which forms high white walls noticeable through all the country around, while further east are large dikes of wildly contorted dolo- mite extending to the Okanogan river. The black slate is only here and there overlaid with dolomite, where the latter has resisted glacial action. Minerals have been found in all these formations. On the eastern slope are veins of silver-lead ore carrying a good percentage of gold in contacts of dolomite and black slate. Through the black slate running on north and south lines are great quartz veins carrying gold, on which are the Triune, Spokane and Wehe groups. On the northern part of the mountain, in the black slate, are large, prominent ledges carrying high-grade silver ore, as well as a good percentage of gold, on which are the Ivanhoe, Empire and Bullfrog.

"In the serpentine and black slate contacts which extend on the northwest side to Mt. Ellameham and on the west overlook Palmer lake are some of the richest gold-bearing veins on the mountain, among which are the Leadville group and the Bunker Hill. On the south end in the diorite are gold-bearing veins carrying a small percentage of silver, on which are the Black Bear, War Eagle, Wisconsin Central, Grand Summit and a large number of others, coursing northwest and southeast. Iron caps are found in the diorite identical in character and in identical formation with those across the International Boundary, and they also occur of large size in diorite walls in the syenitic formation to the west, which runs through Aeneas Mountain, Douglas Mountain, Gold Hill and Mt. Chapacca. Palmer Mountain shows surface disturbance which accounts for the breaking over of some of the ledges, for as depth is attained it is found that they are permanent and that the break-over is merely a surface disturbance. This is proven in the Black Bear, where the greatest depth has been' reached, and agrees with the experience at the Cariboo mine at Camp McKinney, B. C, which is on the same geological formation and shows the same surface displacement. These disturbances caused many prospectors to think their ledges near the surface had given out, and

As there are other lines of travel between Loomis and Oroville let us examine another as seen through the observant eyes of Mr. Frank M. Dallam, proprietor of the Palmer Mountain Prospector, published at Loomis :

"There are three routes to the village on the Similkameen (Oroville), two over Palmer Mountain and one out around the eastern foot of that immense elevation. The two across the mountain are like a ledge divided by a great "horse," as they start together, split asunder at Spectacle lake, and again join at Golden, continuing together to Oroville. * * * All along the road across Palmer are indications of the presence at some time in the past of the prospector. Mounds of rocks, dumps, tunnels and shafts are scattered through the hills. No great work has been accomplished on any one of these numerous claims, and there was, in 1897, at the time of this writing, no mine in operation, but all the labor required to make these holes and get out that dumpage represents in the aggregate a vast amount of hard blows. The land is not altogether given up to mining, as here and there on the benches and draws where springs exist are scattered ranches upon which good crops can be grown. Upon descending the grade into the depression separating the main mountain from the Whiskey Hill spur the road passes numerous veins of quartz croppings. Wehville is a conspicuous object at the foot of the last heavy grade (near Oroville). The 'ville" of the former is made up of two cabins and an innumerable collection of dumps giving the land the appearance of being pitted by small-pox. The Wehe brothers occupy this site, and their holdings extend beyond the reach of the eye. Several letlges run through the country they possess, and large bumps of handsome quartz indicate where the drill has been industriously used. There are tunnels and shafts, cuts and drifts in abundance, and if the hard-working crowd do not strike it it will not Ije on account of lack of perseverance. A short distance beyond, and near Wanicutt lake, a charming little body of water a couple of miles long, and from a quarter to half a mile wide, is Golden. Golden is not a metropolis, but the day has been when it was a pretty swift little place. There are indications of a shortage of population just now, but when the surrounding mines are once again in operation the town will again hum. The site is well chosen. It is a pretty location, perfectly level and of ample dimensions for a city. A mile away the cough of steam and the thump of the stamps of the Tribune mill indicates that something is going on in the vicinity. The stamp mill of the Spokane mine, now silent and deserted, is located a few hundred yards north of the town. A couple of miles further on is Blue Lake, a mountain pool of beautiful blue, but deceptive in appearance, as the fluid is about as palatable as soap suds, it being strongly inpregnated with alkali. Down a long grade the road winds into the valley. Another stretch of a few miles and the road crosses the Similkameen river at a ford, and the town of Oroville that has been in view since leaving the hill is reached. It is situated on the east bank of the Similkameen river, only a short distance from where that river mingles its waters with those of the Okanogan. The land between the two rivers is perfectly flat and only ten or twelve feet above the present low stage of water."

North of Conconully, south of Loomis and about twenty miles west of the Okanogan is the beautiful Sinlahekin valley, one of the fairest tracts in Okanogan county. Of the "Meeting of the Waters" Tom Moore has sung:

Thrown into poetical diction this description aptly applies to the valley of the Sinlahekin. Nature, lavish in blending the topography of Okanogan into scenic beauiy, presents no fairer landscape east of the Cascade range. From any portion of the town of Loomis its beauties may be contemplated, and were its rare features skillfully delineated by an artist the eye could scarcely gaze upon a lovelier canvased picture. Wedged in between parallel ranges of corrugated elevations, this valley is charming at any season of the year. Through its lowest level a pretty stream of limpid water ripples its oddly sinuous way, to be joined by a jolly, boisterous brook, really the larger of the two streams, that leaps and tumbles down its rocky bed from high up among the giant piles that form Mt. Chapacca. Like the cataract of Lodore it bounds and leaps in the initial stages of its journey to the Sinlahekin, assuming a more decorous and milder mood just before it mingles with the staid and stately current that drains the vale through which it flows, only a short distance from the point where it loses its identity in the bosom of the lake. The lustrous tints of autumn enhance its beauty ; it is attractive at all seasons of the year, even when the fingers of frost have clutched its gurgling throat and stifled the babble of its torrential course. From certain elevations a view of the Sinlahekin valley may be gained for miles. The water course stands out boldly marked, winding its crooked way, embowered in brilliant yellow foliage, streaked here and there with green, brown and red, as though Nature in weaving this varigrated ribbon had mixed with the woof the warp of the rainbow. Quaint homesteads nestle in the umbrageous foliage surrounded by stretches of open glebe and pastures green. These are dotted with tranquilly grazing cattle. From either side steep, stony mountains rear their bald or timber-covered pates, high above the plain, with gnarled and knotty pines, cedars and firs clinging tenaciously to the scanty, arid soil which contributes to their sturdy, storm-defying life. Occasionally a more ambitious pinnacle is silvered with scintillating snow. To the north glitter the undulating waters of Palmer Lake. Of this

"From Loomis the way extends for two miles north at the very foot of Palmer Mountain. On one side the beetling crags and grassy slopes of the mountain hang above the road or stretch far up into the zenith, making one's legs fairly ache merely to imagine the exertion necessary to top its summit. Its face is as varied as the disposition of a wayward beauty, and the constantly changing aspect adds fresh interest at every turning. Here the brown rocks shoot up for many feet, a sheer precipice, with huge fragments poising like living things as if preparing for a mighty spring upon the unwary passer-by. Here a brawny pine, clinging with loving fondness to a barren stone, waving its branches in apparent glee far over the heads of modest neighbors, leaving the gazer to wonder by what strange freak the germinating seed ever fell where it did, and creating a greater wonder, without the sign of soil in sight, that it ever found a foothold in the roots that anchored it to the spot. Again wide slides conspicuously marked the face of the eminence, commencing far up the side at the apex of a triangle and spreading widely out as it reached the level, including stones of all sizes, as though the spirit giants of the hills had put their e\il-doers upon the chain-gang and given them the whole mountain to clear away.

"The elements have been at work, and the corroding hand of time has made its imprint upon the sturdy mount as it tloes upon the work of short-lived man. Rain, snow, ice and heat have crumbled rocks and flung down trees and tinted the ledges varied hues. The desecrating hand of man has not been idle. Here and there along the broken, undulating and indented face of the clififs stare out the mouths of tunnels and prospect holes, black, threatening eves that mark the places where in quest of gain the hard iron has punctured the massive rock. Further on old Palmer reaches out one claw to leave it on the ice-cold waters of the lake, and hard was the task to divorce the rock and water and make a place upon which to travel. And every spring this lake, believing not in general utility, and the right of way thereby, swells in its pride of pristine beauty and reaches far up to embrace the unrequiting rock and for days dashes pretty wavelets above the passageway.

"The lake itself is a dainty gem ; its mountain setting outlined on its peaceful b isom. In shape it is like the moon at the first quarter, and fills a space of several miles in length and from a hundred yards to a mile in width. It is like liquid crystal, of the blue that in a woman's eye touches the chord of love, and were it set down somewhere on European soil the aesthetic tourist, with a weakness for rapture, would go into ecstacy over its attractive beauties. As it is, presumably, 'tis but a pond where the pilgrim prospector quenches his burning thirst - for it is cold the summer through - the Indian pitches his wigwam, and the rolliking youngster, with a rude and shapeless twig casts out his line to lure the finny inhabitants to a fryingpan.

But the attraction of the drive is not confined to the ridge of stone that crawls down to bar the way on the east. On the other hand spreads out the valley of the babbling Sinlahekin, narrow but fertile, every foot of which is occupied by the thrifty settler, or is set apart by benign and open-handed government for the benefit of the favored redman. The stream that is fed by the springs and snows and glaciers far up in the mountain fastness, is cold and clear and abounds in trout. Its banks are fringed with a heavy growth of trees and underbrush bearing a light green foliage. The farms that have been cleared by years of laborious toil are limited in extent, but exceedingly fertile, and where the providence of the occupant has planted fruits the orchards are thrifty and l:)ear rich and abundant harvests. The calm and peace and apparent comfort that surround these houses, humble though they be in appearance, have no counterpart in the wide, wide land, and as the traveler gazes upon the scene he could wish for no pleasanter place and feels that he could lay aside the burdens of life and, forgetting the riot and display, the struggles, the faults and failures, the deceit and hypocrisy and the shallowness of the outside world, peacefully dream away the few remaining years alloted to him."

The Puritan settlers of New England were called upon to hew and mold into form their homes in the bleak Atlantic wilderness. In a far more salubrious climate, yet surrounded by similar difficulties, the earlier settlers of Okanogan county were destined to the same laborious employment. That was the rule, yet the exceptions were, and still are. many. There are garden spots scattered here and there throughout the country the soil of which is productive beyond the most sanguine expectations. They have been discovered as mines have been discovered; their development has awakened surprise.

One of these sections is Pogue Flat, named for its first settler. It comprises an almost level table land lying adjacent to, and parallel with the Okanogan river. From north to south its extreme length is about ten miles ; its average width four miles; about twenty-five thousand acres in one body of land. For many years following the first settlement of Okanogan county this section was considered absolutely worthless for agricultural purposes. Prospective settlers were not shown the tract with an idea of locating them within what was thought to be its arid limits. On the contrary they were taken to claims in the hills where there was plenty of excellent water and much timber, and about one-third as much arable land to the acre. But early in 1900 one or two small "shacks" made their appearance on the "flat," and outside the comparatively small tract of land which is accessible to irrigation from Salmon Creek. The following summer a few other rude habitations were added and some fencing was done. In 1902 small patches of sod were broken and, as more of an experiment than otherwise, the first crop was sown on Pogue Flat. Results obtained surprised everyone. The reputation of Pogue Flat as an arable and productive tract of land - a tract long considered arid and sterile - was thoroughly established. And this is but one case in many where land once deemed worthless in Okanogan county has been found satisfactory in every respect. Still this illustration is not particularly exceptional ; it is in line with the agricultural history of the transmontane country.

Agricultural methods in this section do not materially differ from those of other localities. "There appears," says David Griffiths, assistant in charge of range investigations, as prepared for the United States Department of Agriculture, "to be no established time for seeding. Often the seed is scattered on the snow. Sometimes it is sown in the fall and at others in the spring, apparently with equally good results. Along the Okanogan river and Cow Creek many fields of timothy are seen which were established in this way. Some fields yield as much as two and one-half tons per acre. Along the Okanogan and other streams in north central Washington there is a great deal of brush, especially willow, alder and wild rose. The practice is to cut and grub these out, burn the brush, and scatter timothy and red-top seed at the first favorable opportunity. Of course much more seed is required when the land is not plowed and it usually takes several years to secure a good stand. Along Cow Creek some meadows established twenty years ago on sod are in a reasonably good condition to-day, althoug-h they have been cut for hay and pastured during the winter every year."

Quite a noticable feature in the Metlinw Valley, and one that is coming into greater prominence yearly, is dairying. Throughout various portions of this beautiful valley the industry is prosecuted quite successfully. Up to the present time dairying has been conducted on a small scale, yet sufficiently extensive to afford ample proof that, under more favorable conditions, it will be well adapted to this locality. Still, owing to the present limited market for dairy products, by reason of a woeful lack of rail transportation, extensive operations along this line are not warranted. However, despfite the crude and inconvenient methods of transportation shipments of butter were made from the Methow Valley to the coast market during the winter of 1902-03 which netted producers twenty-eight cents per pound.

Okanogan County Fruit Inspector N. Stone has furnished the following statistics showing the amount of fruits grown in the years 1902 and 1903. The late spring of 1903 prevented an increased acreage, and consequently there is a slight decrease in production compared with that of 1902 :

The number of acres of fruit in 1901 was 725 acres, and in 1903. 964 acres. The above calculation is for standard boxes of the different kinds of fruits as they are packed for shipping.

Of all the beautiful streams that contribute their crystal waters to the seething, whirling Columbia, the Methow river, debouching at Pateros, is the finest, and the famous Methow Valley is a succession of charming scenes. The Methow's source is the summit of the Cascades from whence it emerges a tiny creek, unol> trusive and humble as Tennyson's "Brook," destined to "flow on forever." But in its course it assumes more importance, receiving the waters of Squaw, Texas, Gold, Libby, Twisp and Lost rivers ; and all of these irrigate farms, orchards and pastures which in richness cannot be surpassed. Here the nights are warm ; the summer season long and the delightful combination of wind and sunshine contribute to bring fruit to the perfection of lusciousness. Cereals and vegetables do equally well and as nutritious bunch grass and the wild lupin abound on every hand the outlook for remunerative dairying is most favorable.

The valley of the Okanogan river embraces fully one-third of the county. It is rich in mineral deposits; rich in agricultural possibilities and present fruition. Its scenic beauties are marvels to the tourist; there is scarcely a single view point from whicli an attractive landscape is not spread before the eye. Thus the Okanogan valley appeals at once to the artist and the utilitarian. Throughout its entire length Okanogan valley contains an area of very rich soil, aggregating between 75.000 and 100,000 acres. While transportation facilities are insignificant, the various mines supply a market and at remunerative prices. This transportation question is, at present, problematical. A number of surveys have been made. Undoubtedly competing railway systems are watching each other. The new Bellingham Bay & British Columbia railroad, now in process of construction, will probably cross the Okanogan river at its confluence with the Columbia. At present steamers from Wenatchee ply the Columbia to the mouth of the Okanogan at all seasons of the year; going as far up the Okanogan as Riverside during the summer. At Brewster (at the mouth of the Okanogan), and Riverside, stages connect on routes interlacing the entire county. The irrigation problem has not been neglected. The government has had surveyors in the field engaged upon the project. Their latest reports indicate that water from two main branches of Salmon river, which unite below Conconully, will be directed into Green and Brown lakes for distribution through thousands of acres of land in the valleys. It is claimed that this project is assured; that work will be commenced so soon as the surveys are perfected. The Indians on the reservation have already been alloted their portions of the land; the remainder has only to be declared open by congress before which the bill is now pending.

To the east and west of Okanogan valley are mountain ranges. To the westw'ard, across the Methow, the Cascade range, from the most northern height, as far as they extend southward, are yielding their hoards of hidden wealth to the miner and capitalist, abounding as they do in minerals of almost every description, though mainly in' copper, silver, lead, gold, coal and iron. The Cascades are most picturesque and inspiring. Not to any great extent, comparatively, have these mountains been prospected, and with the exception of short intervals the whole range may be called virgin territory where man has never trod ; the widest areas of nature's solitude; the haunt of big game. What they conceal in mineral wealth is a matter of speculation ; a question for the geologist and experienced prospector. But within hundreds of square miles the geologist and prospector have never ventured. Such mineral wealth as may be there lies undeveloped owing to absence of transportation. When every county in Washington is gridironed with railroads as is the case in many of the middle western states, these mountain fastnesses may be called upon to yield their treasures to the exchequer of the world. But in the adjacent valleys some of the richest mines in the state have been revealed. Gold quartz has been taken from them assaying as high as $43,000 per ton. They have proved -a revelation to mining men, showing interlines of gold and secretions of nuggets which have set old, seasoned miners aghast at such wonderful deposits of values. Blocks of telluride quartz have been taken from these districts a description of whose richness sounds fabulous. Ere many years have passed the Cascades will be yielding their wealth to hundreds of thousands of people. Old time California prospectors are not at all backward in making this sweeping prophetic declaration. Swiftly moving streams from the tinkling brooklet to the impetuous mountain torrent dash down the canyons in impatient haste until they gain the lower levels, becoming there more sluggish, and swelling into slowly flowing rivers. And this is where farsighted and sagacious farmers have located many of the best ranches in Washington. Fruits, vegetables and cereals adapted to the temperate zone grow luxuriantly in this favored region.