G. W. Hawes' Indiana State gazetteer and business directory, for 1858 and 1859. Volume One, Part 74

Author: Hawes, George W; Sutherland, James. cn
Publication date: 1858
Publisher: Indianapolis : Geo. W. Hawes, Pub. and Proprietor
Number of Pages: 1306


USA > Indiana > G. W. Hawes' Indiana State gazetteer and business directory, for 1858 and 1859. Volume One > Part 74


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The greatest length of Indiana is near the meridian of Lafayette, while the greatest width is near the latitude of Bloomington and Greensburgh.


TOPOGRAPHICAL CHARACTER.


- Near two thirds of the state is comparatively level, admitting of but little variety of appearance. There are but very few elevations which can lay any claim to the term mountain, although there are many very respectably sized hills or "knobs" along its southern boundary, which vary in height from 50 to 600 feet; and during the summer season are clothed in nature's richest livery. These knobs or bills are generally as high as the principal levels of the interior, and extend at various distances from and parallel to the courses of the river and other streams, the tributa- ries of the Ohio, which through countless ages having been wearing and deepening their rocky channels through the rugged cliffs, until they present in places scenes of sublime and terrific grandeur. Behind these hills a table land spreads out and forms what is termed the interior of the country. Here the scene changes. Instead of bottoms with their mighty forests, the most varied landscape appears, diversified with vast prairies, extensive groves of oak, ash, &c., with here and there large tracts cov- ered with a heavy undergrowth of hickory, from which an extensive and important trade is sustrined in the article of hoop poles, which are one of the principal staples of southern Indiana ..


NATURAL DIVISIONS.


There is such a marked difference between certain sections of the state that lie near its principal rivers and their tributaries, that they constitute its proper natural divisions.


1. The Ohio Valley, including that of the White Water, contains about 5,000 square miles, and might be properly termed the limestone region. The soil here is extremely fertile although much of it is hilly and broken with the numerous tributaries of the


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G. W. HAWES' INDIANA STATE


Ohio running in every direction. Many of these streams, which are swollen to a great height during heavy rains, show in dry weather only the trace of the torrents which disappear nearly as soon as, the storms which occasioned them. About two- thirds of this section or division is very rich and productive, while the remainder, principally the fiats at the heads of the streams, is unprofitable for cultivation.


2. The White River Valley, extends from the Wabash river centrally through the state to the Ohio line, and covers about 9,000 square miles. The surface is uniformly level and covered with heavy forests, except the western portion, which consists of low, rugged hills, prairies and barrens. The entire valley is destitute of rock, and the soils throughout the region are of the most productive and profitable character.


This valley is well supplied with wholesome, never-failing streams and an abund- ance of water power.


3. The Wabash Valley, is much the largest and most important division, and embraces an area of a little more than 12,000 square miles, and comprises the entire scope of country bordering on the river of that name and covering about thirty coun- ties. It is equally fertile but more broken, interspersed with small prairies and bar- rens or oak openings, which are also productive, except in portions of Knox, Sullivan and Clay counties, where is found considerable land that is unproductive and of little value. About 100 miles of the Wabash river, occupying the center of the valley, affords abundant water power, while both the upper and lower parts are deficient in that respect.


4. The northern part of the state is watered by the Kankakee and the two St. Joseph rivers. The soil is mostly poor and rather unfruitful, being high and sandy in places, while low swamps and marl bogs, together with small lakes and walnut forests make up the remainder. About one-half of this portion of the country is totally unfit for culture, and never can be made available for agricultural purposes.


RIVERS AND COMMERCIAL FACILITIES.


The principal navigable river in the State is the Wabash, which is traversed by steamboats of light draft, as far north as Lafayette, for the most part of the boating season. . White river is next in importance, being navigable for many miles in times of high water. There are several other rivers of much importance for water power, but few of them are navigable to any great distance for any thing but flatboats, which are however, a great advantage to the farmer in the disposition of his pro- ducts; but the numerous railroads which now traverse the state, have already super- ceded river travel and transportation, and are more eligible, reliable and profit- able.


CLIMATE, SOIL AND PRODUCTS.


The climate of Indiana embraces a wide range, extending as it does over four degrees of latitude. The extreme southern portion lies in latitude 37º 51', and comes within the wine-growing district, while the northern portion is in latitude 41º 46' north, and is better adapted to the production of the cereal grains. The middle of the state is in about the same latitude with the center of Spain and southern Italy, though the climate will compare more favorably with that of southern Germany. In fact the whole country south of Logansport, is blest with a mild and genial climate, producing all the finer fruits in great abundance. At Indianapolis, the mercury seldom rises above 100° Farenheit, or falls to 15° below zero. So that it will be observed that the mean temperature is about 57º ..


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The climate throughout the state is quite as favorable to health, as in any of the western states. Iu some portions billious and intermittent fevers prevail during the latter part of summer, or during the months of August and september. Congestive and typhus fevers are sometimes fatal in winter, but consumption is comparatively a stranger in the state. The milk sickness which it is said prevails occasionally in certain sections, is regarded by many as the scourge of Indiana; but the writer after having traversed the entire state at various seasons of the year without having ever seen a single case, is inclined to the opinion of its somewhat fabulous existence, and that very little scientific exertion would point ont the causes which are local, and enable them eventually to rid themselves of it entirely.


The soil throughout the state, except a small portion of the extreme north and a few barrens in the western part, is extremely rich and productive, and adapted to the culture of almost anything that the farmer may choose to plant. Corn is the great staple of the state, and is cultivated upon its light, loamy soil to better advantage than any other crop. The wheat crop however, is generally good in the northern part of the state, while in the central and southern portions, hemp, fax,


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sugar cane, silk, and the wine grape, might be cultivated with profit. The climate is very favorable to domestic animals, especially sheep, cattle, horses and hogs. Of the latter, it may be said that they are next in importance to the corn trade. The num- ber of hogs driven out of the state to market amount now to about 1,000,000 per an- num. There are also great numbers of cattle, horses and sheep, which bring a good price in the best markets.


EXTENT OF CULTIVATED LANDS.


Lands in the state under cultivation, amount to about 6,000,000 of acres, leaving about 15,637,760 acres in its primitive wild state, much of which is of such a charac- ter as can never be made available for agricultural purposes. Much of it however, and especially that of the counties bordering on the Ohio, is well suited to the grape culture, to which many enterprising farmers and capitalists have been of late direct- ing their attention. Rlackberries of spontaneous growth abound in profusion through- out this entire region. Much attention has of late been bestowed on the culture of the strawberry, which also yields abundantly.


SWAMP AND UNRECLAIMED LANDS.


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Although there are more than a million acres of swamp lands which have hitherto been regarded as of little or no value, yet it has been clearly shown in the Prize Essay of professor R. T. Brown, in 1853, upon that subject, that the greater portion of them are susceptible of drainage at an expenditure that would amply repay the investment .: We quote verbatim from the Essay embodying many valuable thoughts and suggestions on the management of swamp lands. He says: "Two circumstances may give rise to swamp lands, to wit:"


Ist. Springs, or even streams of surface water, descending from the higher land, reaching a valley may lose their channels and spread over the surface of the level land, rendering large districts swampy.


2d. Summit land, which has but little surface inclination from a dead level, where the drainage is obstructed by fallen timber, accumulated leaves and other floating rubbish, or by tussocks of grass growing in the natural channels for drain- age. The operation of these two causes has given to Indiana more than a million of acres that have been condemned as "swamp land," with perhaps as many more that have been sold by the general government as dry lands, from their being in small parcels and attached to tracts that were dry.


To reclaim this amount of soil and bring it into active production, is an important consideration, and one that the more commends itself to us, from the fact that these lands are most generally of the best quality of soil, when rendered sufficiently dry to admit of cultivation. Nature has three manners of disposing of the water that falls on the earth; or, in other words. three methods of drying the earth. These are : Ist, evaporation : 2d, drainage; 3d, absorption.


We place evaporation first on the list, because we regard it as the great instru- mentality for carrying off the redundant moisture from the earth-an agent whose efficiency in drying swamp lands has been greatly overlooked. Indeed the swampy character of much of the summit-lands of Indiana is to be referred mainly to obstruc- ted evaporation.


Those lands have a strong, tenacious sub-soil of clay, almost if not entirely imper- vious to water. This cuts off most effectually all escape of moisture downward. Cov- ered with heavy forest trees, whose leafy canopy completely excludes every ray of sunshine, while a dense undergrowth of smaller shrubbery prevents a free circula- tion of currents of air at the earth's surface. Thus excluded from every means of evaporation aud absorption, with but an imperfect surface drainage to dispose of the water that falls on them, they cannot be otherwise than swampy.


To dry and render tillable such lands as these, the first step is to strip them bare, and expose them fully to the sunshine and the breeze. It will not accomplish our object, if we remove the forest and the undergrowth, and suffer a crop of weeds, or even grass, to take their place, and as completely exclude the sun and air from direct access to the earth. We deem it a great error that many fall into, in attempting to dry swamp lands, that they put them in meadow, and thus cover them for at least half the summer from the sunshine by such a deuse coat of grass as only this quality of soil is capable of producing.


If swamp lands are timbered, the first consideration is to remove the shade. Then secure a full exposure of the surface to the evaporating influences. This is most econo- mically accomplished by close pasturage with cattle and sheep. It is an observation in almost everybody's mouth, that "tramping the land dries it." The mis take in this


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G. W. HAWES' INDIANA STATE


is, that while the treading of the stock has little or no effect in producing the result, the close pasturing and consequent bare exposure of the earth to the sunshine, &c., has, by evaporation, carried off the redundant moisture, and the land which of late was a swamp has become dry. We will properly appreciate the importance of evap- oration in drying swamp lands, when we remember that all the water that falls on the surface of the territory drained by the Mississippi river, but about one six- teenth part, finds its way to the Gulf of Mexico through the channel of that stream.


The remaining fifteen-sixteenths, is taken up by the atmosphere again, through the process of evaporation. In drying land by drainage, we can witness the process with our eyes-we can see the water passing off in our ditches, but evaporation does its work silently and invisibly. Hence it is that its importance is so often under- rated, if not wholly overlooked. But we have said, and it is capable of demonstra- tion, that its influence in drying the soil is, to that of drainage, as fifteen" to one. To remove the obstacles that obstruct the natural surface drains and to expose the earth to a free evaporation, is frequently all that is necessary to make the first qual- ity of land out of that which in its natural state, was deemed utterly worthless. In those lands, however, that are rendered swampy by springs, or strea.rs proceeding from higher grounds, and losing their channels in the valleys, open ditches of suffi- cient capacity to carry off all the water in time of freshets will be necessary. These when once made, will, in most instances, become the permanent chanrels of streams, and will, with but little attention, keep themselves open.


Large wet prairies often skirt the margin of our western streams, which our farm- ers regard as waste lands-utterly irreclaimable. And it is frequently true, that notwithstanding the most perfect surface, evaporation is obtained, and a thorough system of parallel ditching is adopted, yet they stubbornly remain marshes, too wet for any useful purpose. In these instances we will almost invariably find the source of all the trouble in springs that break out from the hills in the rear, and enter the marsh a few feet below its surface. A ditch at the foot of the hill, and running par- allel with it, of sufficient depth to reach the "hard pan," on which the reservoir of spring water rests, and of such dimensions as to carry off all the water afforded by the springs, together with that which will descend from the hill in time of heavy rains, will most effectually dry the worst marshes of this description.


I have observed several instances of accidental drainage of this character along the Wabash and Erie canal. Between the town of Bloomington and the Wabash river, was formerly a wet prairie of the most hopeless character. The canal was excavated at the foot of the bluff on which the town is situated. In the excavation a fountain of water was cut extending several rods along the line of the canal and discharging & copious stream.


The result was, that the marsh beyand in a short time became dry land, adding much to the convenience and health of the town.


The same is true of a most unpromising marsh in the south-western part of the city of Lafayette, where the cut for the track of the New Albany and Salem railroad serves the purposes of a drainage ditch. But the larger proportion of the wet lands of Indi- ana are not of this class. They are the summit lands, lying along the line of water shed between the principal streams, aud occupying the most elevated positions in the state. The water on this class of lands is almost invariably surface water, held up from percolation downward by a subsoil of blue clay, entirely impervious to water, and excluded from evaporation by dense forests, or a heavy cout of tall grass, while the drainage is obstructed by fallen timber, decaying grass of last year's crop, &c. When these obstacles are removed, as we have indicated above, it the soil yet remains too wet for profitable cropping, then recourse must be had to underground drainage by means of covered ditches. I prefer a covered to an open ditch, because it effects the drainage as perfectly, if not more so, and is less liable to become obstructed, while it is not in the way of cultivation by plow, harrow or drill. More- over, we may effect a more perfect drainage by multiplying our ditches, or rather, by adopting a regular system of ditches; making a main trunk following the line of lowest depression in the piece of land to be drained, and extending from its lateral branches on either side, sufficiently close to each other to dry effectually the surface between them.


In constructing under drains, several methods have been adopted. In Scotland, I have learned from a well informed native of that country, covered ditches are exten- sively employed in the most highly cultivated districts of the "low lands." These are made by first opening a ditch from twenty inches to three feet deep, and then filling it from ten to twenty inches with loose stones. Over this is placed a covering of sod, over which the loose earth is thrown until the ditch is filled. This method


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could be used with economy in but a small portion of the state-the swamp lands generally lying remote from stone. A method that has been very extensively used in variony portions of the west, is as follows: A ditch is made about twenty inches deep and twelve or fourteen inches wide, with neatly trimmed perpendicular banks ; split timber resembling barrel heading, eighteen inches long and about one-fourth of an inch thick, is placed on end in one corner of the bottom of the ditch, and leaned against the opposite bank-thus covering a triangular space through which the sur- face water may freely escape. In a solid clay sub-soil, this method answers the pur- puse well; but in wet prairie and in much of the "black burr oak land," the bank will become too soft to support the weight of the earth filling the ditch, and will give way and suffer the boards to fall upon The bottom of the ditch, and thus obstruct the drainage. A drain that will cost a trifle more than this, and is every way more per- manent, is made by placing timbers about six inches wide and three inches thick, against each side of a perpendicular ditch eighteen inches wide. These are then covered with boards, as used in the former case, and the ditch filled to the level as before, or one of the side timbers might be used without serious injury. In survey- ing a piece of land that is proposed to be drained, the farmer should avail himself of the earliest hour after a heavy rain, and observe the natural position and direction of the currents of water, and mark out his ditches accordingly. A main ditch or leader, may require to be much larger than we have indicated. The size, however, should always be proportioned to the area of surface to be drained.


If minks, muskrats, and other burrowing animals are likely to be troublesome about the ditches, (which is frequently the case, ) all that is necessary to prevent their depredations is to fill the mouth of the ditch with stone, after the Scotch method.


In swamp lands reclaimed by under drainage, when a growing crop is on the ground, the position of the concealed ditches may be distinctly traced by the more vigorous growth of vegetation in their immediate vicinity. I have heard this phe- nomenon referred wholly to the influence of the air admitted from beneath and per- mitted to circulate freely through the porous soil above. It would perhaps be wrong to deny that this cause has some influence in producing the result noticed ; for this quality of soil is generally rich in humus, much of which would be rendered soluble by a free access to the oxygen of the air, which would otherwise remain insoluble, and consequently exert no influence on the growing crop. But we regard the result mainly referable to other and more obvious causes.


The surface water to be carried off by the ditch, holds in suspension or imperfect solution, much of the finer and richer portion of the soil.


The loose earth above the ditch operates as a strainer, and arrests this in its pas- sage downwards, thus greatly enriching grounds adjacent to the ditch.


Ald to this the fact, that a portion of the sub-soil becomes mixed with the surface mould in the operation of making and filling the ditch.


In wet prairies, and in the " black swamps" of the timbered land, this is an import- ant consideration; for one of the principal defects of these soils is the deficiency of clay nnd sand, which will be supplied by mixing the sub-soil with the surface mould. To these causes jointly, we would attribute the more luxurient growth of vegetation in the immediate neighborhood of under drains. The observing farmer will readily perceive the advantage of using under drains in preference to open ditches, in point of economy.


All the finer particles of soil held in suspension would be carried off by an open ditch, while it would be retained if we substitute a covered one.


There remains to be noticed a third means of disposing of surface water, to wit: absorption. Every one has observed that in a compact soil unplowed, every small shower, if not carried off by surface drainage, will stand in puddles until evaporated. Now, if this same soil, to the depth of six or eight inches, had been rendered mellow by repeated stirring and cultivation, it would have absorbed even a heavy rain with- out leaving any surface water visible. We therefore write down deep plowing-sub- soil plowing, if you please-as an important auxiliary in drying swamp lands. Ten inches of loose surface soil, in but a moderate state of dryness, will absorb two inches of water over its entire surface, and this would be a very heavy summer rain.


To secure the most perfect absorption, the soil stirred by the plow, should be ren- dered perfectly mellow, which is a condition in many clay sub-soils not very easily obtained.


In this quality of lands, the mellowing process will be much facilitated by the addi- tion of lime or some other alkaline dressing.


A faithful and persevering adherence to these means, will not fail to render tilla- ble almost any specimen of swamp lands.


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There may be ponds and deep marshes, which, from the peculiarity of their sitna- tion, cannot be drained; but extensive observation has convinced me that those instances are much less common than most persons suppose.


Indiana enjoys a more perfect summit drainage than either of the neighboring states, lying like her, between the lakes and the Ohio river. There is a peculiarity about the Wabash river, that challenges our admiration of the wisdom displayed in its adaptation to the purposes of summit drainage. If we trace the Wabash from its mouth upwards, we shall find its general direction north a few points east, until we reach a position nearly equi-distant between the lake and the Ohio. It then sweeps a curve to the east, and traverses a summit for more than one hundred miles in a direction nearly at right angles with its lower course.


The same tendency to an east and west direction is observed in its larger tributa- ries, as White river, Tippecanoe, Eel river, &c.


This arrangement supplies the summit lands of Indiana with a well distributed „ system of running streams, which will greatly facilitate the artificial drainage where it shall be deemed necessary."


AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIONS.


Enough has already been said of the climate and soil of Indiana, to show conclu- sively, that her capacity to produce with an efficient system of agriculture, can not be excelled by any of her sister states. It only remains for the farmers of Indi- ana to improve the advantages spread in profusion around them, and great must be their reward. We have not the means at hand for giving the exact amounts of the different products of 1858. The following figures, however, may be considered approximates, which show that the amounts far exceed those of former years :


Last year there was grown :


Bushels.


Wheat, ..


Bushels. .9,350,975.


Rye, ..


183,060.


Corn,


39,833,366.


Barley, 6,774


Oats, .. 4,621,800.


Hay, (tons). 342,118.


From the above figures, it will be seen that the products of the state, considering the amount of tillable land, equal if not excel any of the neighboring states. Indi- ana is well adapted to the raising of swine, which being chiefly fattened on corn, commands a ready market at prices that afford a handsome profit.


As yet the proper attention has not been bestowed upon fruit raising, although there are many fine varieties which have been cultivated with satisfactory results. The mountain ranges or river hills, whose tops are well adapted to the successful cul- tivation of the peach, are still revelling in the habilaments with which nature first clothed them, while the valleys beneath are only capable of insuring an average crop about once in three years.


Hay, as an article of commerce in the southern part of the state, is quite an im- portant item, many thousand tuns annually, (being pressed and baled in convenient form and size, ) are shipped to New Orleans and intermediate ports with highly remu- nerative results.


The timbered ergions of Indiana are inexhaustibe. Her forests abound in all the varieties of trees natural to the soil and climate. Near the rivers are found an abun- dance of the best of timber for boat or ship building purposes, which of late years, has been an important brauch of her productive industry. Water privileges are abundant almost every where, many of which are unimproved, inviting the mechanic and capitalist to develop thein.




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