The Government of Iowa (1911)/The Land and Resources
THE GOVERNMENT OF IOWA.
CHAPTER I.
THE LAND AND RESOURCES.
The Physical Basis of Government. — Physiography has always been an important factor in moulding the character of a people and determining the nature of their political institutions. We may, therefore, better understand our own State by first considering its physical features and its material resources. Iowa is renowned as an agricultural and stock-raising Commonwealth. It lies in the very heart of the great Mississippi Valley, a region unsurpassed in the productiveness of its soil. In fact, a large part of the world looks to the Mississippi Valley for its necessary food supply.
The State Boundaries. — The State of Iowa stretches from the majestic Mississippi on the east to the rapid Missouri on the west. It is bounded on the north by Minnesota, and on the south by Missouri. The exact location of the southern boundary line almost precipitated an armed conflict between Iowa, which was then a Territory, and Missouri, in 1839. Within this imperfect rectangular area lie 55,475 square miles, or 35,504,000 acres, of the most fertile land the sun has ever shone upon.
The Land. — Iowa is usually described as a rolling prairie; and such, indeed, is its general topography. One of our State Geologists, the late Professor Samuel Calvin, says: "It would seem that a very short chapter ought to be sufficient to include all that can be said concerning the physical features of Iowa; for the state is simply an extensive plain — over large areas a very monotonous plain — lying between the great rivers and rising but little above them at any point." Yet here and there, especially along the watercourses, rugged hills and picturesque bluffs often rise to the height of three or four hundred feet. A part of this hilly region in the northeastern part of the State has aptly been called "the Switzerland of Iowa."
The Prairies. — "It is estimated," says Dr. White, an earlier State Geologist, "that seven-eighths of the surface of Iowa was prairie when the State was first settled." To the early explorer and pioneer, who had fought his way through the stubborn forests and underbrush of the eastern part of the continent, these treeless prairies were an object of great wonder and interest. To stand upon them was like being out in midocean. The horizon seemed like a perfect circle; and the heavens rose like an inverted bowl above the explorer's head. Is it any wonder that on some of the early maps the Iowa country is designated as a "Great Desert"? The early pioneers clung to watercourses, where timber, so necessary for building and fuel most abounded. They seemed to be afraid to settle in the open country, being ignorant of the richness of the prairie soil.
The Work of the Glaciers. — How came Iowa to be a country in which the plough found itself almost independent of the axe and the grub hook? Geology, whose records have been written deep across the whole face of this fair Commonwealth, must answer. Professor Calvin says that "these geologic records, untampered with, and unimpeachable, declare that for uncounted years Iowa, together with the great valley of the Mississippi, lay beneath the level of the sea. So far as it was inhabited at all, marine forms of animals and plants were its only occupants." Countless ages passed; the waters disappeared; plant and animal life came to abound only to be ground down and destroyed later by the great sheets of ice and snow which flowed down from the north. Devastating as they were, the glaciers made Iowa what it is to-day.
The Soil. — "Soils of uniform excellence would have been impossible," says Professor Calvin, "in a non-glacial Iowa. The soils of Iowa have a value equal to all of the silver and gold mines of the world combined. And for this rich heritage of soils we are indebted to great rivers of ice that overflowed Iowa from the north and northwest. The glaciers in their long journey ground up the rocks over which they moved and mingled the fresh rock flour from granites of British America and northern Minnesota with pulverized limestones and shales of more southern regions, and used these rich materials in covering up the bald rocks and leveling the irregular surface of preglacial Iowa." Thus in the course of the ages Iowa was made habitable for plant, animal, and man through the operation of natural laws.
The Resources of Iowa. — The census of Iowa for the year 1905 gives the number of farms in the State as 209,163, representing 33,228,109 acres of land. The estimated value of these farms is $1,552,106,449, not including the value of buildings and farm implements. Upon these 209,163 farms the great bulk of the wealth of Iowa is produced. Corn is the chief farm product, the annual crop being estimated at 346,577,988 bushels; but wheat, oats, barley, and rye are also produced in goodly quantities, to say nothing of hay, vegetables, fruits, and berries. The total value of farm products in Iowa in the year 1905 was estimated at $203,888,540. The value of live stock (cattle, hogs, sheep, horses, and fowls) upon the farms of Iowa is even greater than the value of the products of the soil, being estimated in 1905 at $218,447,468. If now we add to these two already large sums the value of the Iowa farms and the estimated annual value of the mineral products, such as coal, clay, stone, gypsum, lead, and zinc ($14,961,293), we have a grand total of $437,297,301. But these figures, almost beyond comprehension, still give us only an imperfect idea of the wealth of Iowa. Manufactures are rapidly growing in this great agricultural and stock-raising State; and the value of the annual products of 4788 manufacturing establishments is given as $160,604,161.
The Railroads. — To carry the products of Iowa to the markets of the world, private enterprise has literally covered the State with a network of railroads. Over nine thousand miles of rails traverse the State; and every one of our ninety-nine counties is crossed by one or more railroads. Indeed, it is asserted that few farmers are more than ten miles distant from a railroad station.
The Climate. — It is not the soil alone that has made Iowa rich and prosperous: the climate must also be taken into account. Millions of acres of fertile land are scarcely better than a desert of sand if climatic conditions are not favorable to the growth of plant and animal life. The director of the Iowa Weather and Crop Service says: "Situated near the geographical center of the United States, too far inland to receive the equalizing thermal effects of winds blowing directly from the oceans, the climate of Iowa is strictly continental in type. This implies a very wide range in temperature, winters of considerable severity, summers of almost tropical heat, and a large percentage of sunshine as compared with insular regions. As there are no mountain ranges, nor considerable differences in the altitude of the several sections, the climate of the state is quite homogeneous.… In fact, it is the best watered and most productive mid-continent region known on earth. Its worst drouths and seasons of floods have never been famine breeders." A complete failure of crops has never been known in Iowa.
QUESTIONS ON THE TEXT.
1. What is the area of Iowa in square miles? In acres?
2. Why were the prairies avoided by the earliest settlers?
3. What has made the soil of Iowa so fertile?
4. What are the chief farm products of Iowa?
5. What are the chief mineral products of Iowa?
6. What are the characteristics of the Iowa climate?