Everywhere we go we see men, women, and children cutting and piling the brush and logs that have covered the ground since the days of the logger. Everyone seems to be trying to clear more land than his neighbor, and get it ready to produce the crops that are so badly needed all over the world, and as we stop a minute to take a better view of what each one has done, we hear the boom of dynamite that is following the brush lines as they are being pushed back.
In the north the land-clearing line is called the firing line, a term which can be taken literally, for the land-clearing front is continually under fire and clouds of smoke from burning debris.
5. The sturdy new settlers, the last pioneers and frontiersmen in the country, are followed, especially along rivers where water power is at hand, by industrial workers. Here and there are appearing thriving manufacturing and commercial towns--the last stage in the opening up of a new country to civilization.
But the most important work in the wilderness at present is that of the modern land colonization companies. To give an idea of their work and methods it is necessary to describe one of these companies in detail.
The particular company investigated with special attention is located in the wilderness of one of the North Middle Western states. In general the company is applying the same business methods to land colonization as Mr. Ford is applying to automobile production--production of new farms on a large scale so as to diminish the overhead expense, and standardization of various colonization methods. The guiding test is the success of the new settlers on the company's land. Failures among the settlers are avoided and fought against by the company as though they were a dangerous epidemic. "Each failure among our settlers is a bad advertisement for our company, a loss to us, and an evidence of defects in our business methods," stated the company's head.
To insure the success of the settlers and the settlement, the company proceeds as follows: The most careful study is made of the tract of land which the company intends to acquire for colonization purposes. Not only is the tract of land closely looked over by the company's officials, but land experts, such as soil surveyors, are engaged to examine the land from the viewpoint of its agricultural possibilities. Federal and state surveyors' reports are also used in considering the possibilities of the land.