The Case for Jerico, 1889

Editor’s note

The May 3, 1889 issue of the Jerico Springs Optic included a supplement promoting Jerico, its region, its people and its resources. Most likely written by Theodore L. Kerr. the editor and publisher, the following introductory story laid out the 7-year-old town’s case for possible residents. Some of it is illegible; the physical newspaper the microfilm depicts was in poor condition. I’ve included “unreadable” in italics in several places; there is but one or two words missing unless otherwise noted. The story featured one of the multi-deck headlines favored at the time and I’ve tried to reflect it here. – jcb 9/30/2020

Jerico Springs

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Cedar County Mo., and the advantages offered to

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Those in search of Health,Wealth and Happy Homes

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A country where the raising of horses, mules, cattle and

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Hogs yield large returns and grain growing is profitable

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Jerico is a mining town – coal, iron, lead and zinc

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Strong evidence of natural gas and the probability that

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Jerico will be the greatest manufacturing town in the west.

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Soft water, mild climate and

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the greatest Health resort in the world

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You are invited to come.

In calling the attention of the home seeker to the numerous advantages of this section, we do so with the hope and expectation of increasing our population and developing our resources. Individually, we have no land to sell nor are we paid by anyone having land for sale, but this is our home because we firmly believe this country more healthy, pleasant and offering greater advantages to a man of limited means than any other place we know of.

To accumulate a home and business in sections well developed requires the labor of years while here the task is comparatively easy. It is our desire to see this section thickly peopled, because then the resources in the country will be developed, better markets will be secured, and the property and business of each individual will be enhanced in proportions to his interest, and to the extent to which the section may be developed it is evident to our mind that there is a great opportunity to establish an important and wealthy city at this point, and it is with the desire that others may come and assist and share in the profits of our success that we place the reasons for a faith in Jerico Springs before our readers. 

Cedar County

is situated in the second tier of counties east of Kansas and 4th North of the Arkansas line, and has an area of 480 square miles, or 316,000 acres of land. Financially, the county is in as good a shape as any county in the West. The eastern half of the county is a timbered country with only a few small prairies; the western is mostly prairie, with belts of timber along this streams and beautiful groves on the highland in the distance resembling orchards more than groves of forest trees.

The soil

is red mulatto, black loam and white unreadable. The red mulatto is adapted to the cultivation of fruit; an apple orchard planted on it never failed to produce a crop of apples. It is equally as good for wheat, potatoes, root vegetables, and clover and bluegrass find a congenial home in it. The alluvial soil is found in the river and creek bottoms and prairie valleys and is the farmer’s favorite soil for corn, unreadable magnificent wheat crops are grown on land of this character. The black loam found principally on the broad prairies produce the heaviest drops of corn but wheat and all the grasses, vegetables and fruits, grow luxuriantly and attain the highest degree of perfection.

Society

Nearly every state in the Union is represented among the people of Cedar County and they comprise that class full of determination and an independent spirit. The people are moral, industrious and hospitable, and extend a unreadable welcome to all who come here to better their condition and assist in the development of the country.

Timber

Black and white walnut, white, black and shell bark hickory, blackjack, sugar tree, common maple, red bud, pawpaw, unreadable, huckleberry, black and blue ash, birch, unreadable, persimmon, wild cherry, sycamore, elm, hazel, box elder, unreadable mulberry and all the different species of oak common to this latitude, unreadable the principal streams lined with cedar, from which our county derives its name.

Building stone

A very fine grade of building stone is found in Cedar County, a large quarry of  which is found immediately north of Jerico. This stone is susceptible to artistic unreadable, examples of which can be seen in any of the buildings of the city.

Coal

A body of coal 6 miles wide and 16 miles long has been developed in Jerico, that is, farmers have discovered coal and are using it for family purposes and to supply the coal trade from the extent of territory described. This coal is of the peacock variety, is harder than bituminous and softer than anthracite. It is the best coal for all purposes. In the west blacksmiths prefer it to the Pittsburgh, Kansas, coal even at an increased cost. The time when this section of Cedar County will become one of the greatest coal mining centers in the west is limited to the time when transportation facilities have been secured. at the present time Jerico supplies a number of neighboring towns with coal, but the lack of railroad transportation is a serious drawback to this industry, which will soon become one of the most important features of the country. The price of coal is $2 per ton at the mines. It will take generations to exhaust the supply even with the most extensive mining.

Water

is found in the thousands of never failing springs as pure as ever run from the Earth, and can be had nearly anywhere in the county, and as soft as rainwater by digging from 15 to 40 ft deep. The county is traversed by Bear, Cedar and Horse creeks, Big and Little Sac rivers running on the north and fed by springs furnishing an abundance of water power for propelling all kinds of machinery.

Fruit 

This is peculiarly a fruit country. Apples, peaches, pears, cherries, grapes and in fact every kind of fruit peculiar to this climate, grows here in great abundance. Among the specimens of fruit brought to our offices by neighboring farmers were peaches measuring from nine to 10 inches in circumference; apples weighing from one to one and a half pounds each; and pears that measure 12 inches around one way and 13 in the other. In quantity and quality, we believe fruits of all kinds do better here than in any other section we know of. Wild fruits grow in abundance. To anyone willing to engage in raising fruit for profit we believe that this section offers the greatest inducements. Fruit never fails to yield a beautiful harvest here

Rye

is absolutely a safe crop and is equal to two ordinary crops, as it pays for its seed and sewing for fall, winter and spring pasturage, after which it yields a large crop of grain.

Tobacco

As fine tobacco as is produced in the United States (the unreadable regions of Virginia not excepted) can be grown here, and land considered only 2nd or 3rd class for common farm purposes is first class for tobacco and produces the finest and most valuable article in the great tobacco market of our country.

Meadow

Timothy, clover, red top, orchard grass, etc succeed well wherever tried. In the settled portion of the county, where the raw grasses have been eaten out by stock, bluegrass is rapidly taken its place and air many years all our country that is not under cultivation will be unbroken bluegrass sward.

Stock raising

is the principal business, and the one from which our farmers at present derive the greatest amount of their income. Horses, mules, cattle, sheep and hogs are extensively raised and the short and mild winters, abundance of fine pasturage and the fact that buyers are always ready to buy all surplus stock makes this a superior country for the enterprising stock grower.

Other crops

Corn is the staple crop of the county. Wheat and oats are also largely raised. A complete failure of these crops was never known.There are some castor beans, flax and broom corn grown in the county.

Lead and zinc

Fine deposits of both lead and zinc have been found at various places near the city, but owing to the lack of sufficient capital, the owners have not developed them. Both of these industries will be extensively carried on after the necessary capital and transportation have been secured.

Iron

North of the city there are immense deposits of iron ore and the closeness of large bodies of unreadable and coal will reduce the cost of production to a point unreadable competition with any portion of the United States. The first blast furnace will bring about a great at change in the future of Jerico as it did with the city of Birmingham.

Health

In regard to health this area has no superior. The water in this portion of the county is soft and pure and its use has cured many cases of kidney disorders. There are no swamps or stagnant water and no malaria. The air is pure and wholesome and many people move their families here principally because of this great blessing.

Manufacturing

Jerico is destined to become a great manufacturing center because a great variety of the raw materials needed in the arts and trades are found here in almost endless quantities. Food is raised in great abundance and the country very pleasant and one in which healthfulness is promoted. The All-Purpose Harrow factory is located at this place This is an institution which promises to grow into an extensive establishment. This implement will perform seven different kinds of farm work and is proclaimed by every farmer who sees it work to be the best harrow made. There is one large flowering mill, two brickyards and a tile factory. 

Natural gas

There is no doubt about Jerico being underlain with natural gas, though not yet developed. The first incident going to prove this to be a fact happened several years ago when a citizen, Mr. unreadable Reynolds dug a cellar which the rains filled with water. Bubbles came to the surface, which on being lighted burned. The second proof was the discovery of gas in a well and coming through a fracture in the rock at the bottom which also burned. The third evidence consists in the following: The well just referred to was drilled to a depth of 143 feet. For 2 weeks, the drill passed through lead and zinc but owing to a lack of funds the work was abandoned and the well, which was located on a low piece of ground. allowed to be covered at by a small unreadable. Daily and sometimes oftener, the water covering the mouth of this well is violently thrown into the air sometimes 15 feet high and wetting this rounding banks.

Railroads

Jerico has just as good a prospect for one or more railroads as any town could have and not actually have the road.

The examination of the St Louis and San Francisco system will show that their lines extend from St Louis to Monett, Mo., and there it divides into three branches, one going south into Texas and there combining with the Pacific coast trades; another going west to the Indian Territory and still another going west of unreadable into Western Kansas. This vast system unreadable to Kansas City unreadable running through this city by extending the line from Monett to Kansas City it will connect the system with Kansas City in the most direct and practical manner. The route has been permanently located the entire distance and at no point does its grade exceed 50 feet to the mile, to which grade the engineers were limited. The proposed road which has located its route through this city is the Chicago, Jefferson City & unreadable, and this company has secured the right of way and proposes to unreadable building early next spring.

Disadvantages

There is no portion of the world without disadvantages, some to a greater and some to a less extent. The greater and only real disadvantage that we can find for this country is the market. It is true that fair prices are realized for livestock and grain, but fruit and vegetables are ridiculously unreadable due to the great abundance, limited local demand and inferior shipping facilities. In less than a year, however, we will be only about 6 hours travel from Kansas City. Three lines unreadable.

Advantages

Occasionally a man from unreadable country comes here and at first objects to our hills. While we are to an extent surrounded and protected by hills they are few and and unreadable to the country of Jerico and in the opinions of the old settlers they are a blessing instead of a drawback.

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… healthful and altogether the industrious and thrifty man with small means will find here one of the best locations to be found anywhere in the nation to make a home amid surroundings at once delightful and furnishing the elements out of which industry begets prosperity and leads to the happiness of those who adopt the one and enjoy the other. The man who comes here from the long dreary winners of Northern and Eastern States and saves what he is compelled to spend there in extra preparations  in no needful or profitable here, will be surprised to find how rapidly the savings accumulate and how soon he has been able to place himself and family and position of comparative ease and comfort.

This is undoubtedly one of the very best fruit sections of America. Our upland, which is the most adapted to fruit raising, can now be bought at less prices and on reasonable terms. Before the time this land can be set to fruit and brought to bearing, Jerico will the connected with Kansas City by rail and fruit delivered to the depot at Jerico will reach Kansas City in about 6 hours. The greater the number who engage in this business, the greater the public will be for better and cheapee shipping facilities, and. in the demand for cheap fruit can never be satisfied. unreadable are here now making arrangements for this business and they are unreadable to have others join them.

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