and his machine a Peerless, credit for the best automobile work I have yet encountered. Mr. Parker had been recommended to me at the Denver Omnibus and Cab Company as thoroughly posted in regard to the roads, etc. He drove the great machine thirty, forty and even fifty miles an hour without discomfort to his passengers. He said it was the only machine he had been able to find that would accomplish this work without jolt or jar.

Although it was March, the trip was not overly cold, owing to the dry air of that climate.

"Where shall we go" was the first question asked by Mr. Parker.

We Decide to See

Successful Irrigationists

"I want to see actual irrigation in operation," I replied. "I wish to interview irrigationists as to their experiences raising the various crops of which I have heard. so much."

"Then we better go westward up the Clear Creek Valley," he replied, and Mr. Armstrong concurring, the machine whirled. through the streets of Denver over block after block of smooth asphalt pavement which would put Chicago to shame. passed miles of beautiful bungalow residences, surrounded by lawns and shade trees. Mind you, these are not necessarily large nor expensive. A large majority are one story

We

and of few rooms. These bungalow residences which I saw in Denver and all through the district from there to Greeley are the greatest asset of that section. They are fitted to every citizen.

Those Bungalow Homes are

Denver's Best Feature

Whether one can afford to pay little or much and whether he rents or buys, they make it possible for population to enjoy existence. Go over Eastern cities from end to end and you will not find a neat little bungalow home within the reach of the average citizen. He must be wealthy or live in the surroundings of poverty, crowded into a flat house or a small residence like chickens in a crate.

Those bungalow homes were the best things I saw out there and you are apt to hear more of it before I am through, for if there is anything worth enthusing over, it is that which makes the home beautiful and attainable.

Well, we had swung out of Denver westward and I had settled back to a nice long run before we should reach irrigated land when, right at the city limits, I saw something that caused me to exclaim, "Hold on, Mr. Parker there is something I want photographed." A row of those trees which tographed." A row of those trees which look green and beautiful all the year round were stretched along a driveway, making a picturesque foreground for a lovely bunga

low with a row of neat out-houses behind it and an irrigated orchard beside it.

While Mr. Harry Walter, the expert Denver photographer I had taken along, got out his best lens to catch a view of the place, I walked in through a grilled wrought iron gate inscribed "Pinehurst." I rang the door bell. An intellectual man responded.

"I don't suppose you get quite enough out of your orchard to pay all the bills of a place like this," I asked abruptly.

"I get about $1,000 a year out of my fruit" he replied shortly.

"What kind of fruit do you raise?" "Cherries and plums, but I am pretty busy and you will have to excuse me."

Architect Huddard and

His Irrigated Estate

He started to retreat. I explained my mission and produced Mr. Moffat 's letter, whereupon he grew more communicative and I discovered that his name was John J. Huddard, an eminent architect of Denver and that home which I had supposed was a farm bungalow had cost about $16,000 and is the most complete and beautiful illustration of the magnificent country home a man could build for himself in a country like that, while the place itself is an irrigated private estate maintained for the comfort and pleasure of the occupants, worth close to $30,000 or a good deal more than $1,000 an acre. Mr. Huddard, enthused with

my mission, took me through his home which ought to be described in the Ladies Home Journal to the extent of about four pages with pictures, for the furniture is about 300 degrees better than the best mission, being made by Mr. Huddard himself, or from his own designs.

Here is a Bungalow Planned

For the Whole Family

The bungalow is planned to give coziness and spaciousness combined and is curiously organized to serve both Mr. Huddard and his family. Mrs. Huddard, with their little girl, has her sleeping rooms up stairs, while Mr. Huddard makes a study, a library and a place of repose out of a wing on the first floor where he works as late as he wants to at night without keeping the family awake. He supplements his mental effort by a workshop in the chain of out-buildings, wherein he accomplishes by the hand what has been planned by the brain.

In the words of Mrs. Huddard, "We have achieved as near an ideal existence as one can ask for. We lived in Denver for years and that was like living in jail. That is the trouble with the American people. They crowd into the cities. I grew tired and restless, my husband grew nervous and irritable. One day I decided to get away from it all. I came out here and found this place. It was a tumbled down affair, but those trees attracted me. It could be irrigated and inade into a beautiful place. So we bought it and we have been making it a fad ever since, getting more enjoyment out of it every day."

Mr. and Mrs. Huddard took me down stairs and showed me ingenious devices for heating, etc.

There were seven large pans of beautiful cream in the dairy room and Mrs. Huddard told me that they came from one milking of

one little Jersey cow called "Kitty Girl the Second," which they had purchased from Caleb Parfet, and which supplies them with all the milk, cream, butter and butter milk they can possibly consume and more too.

I cannot begin to tell how rich and delicious the cream was. Then we went out and saw the house where the cow lives in luxury, where the dogs have little apartments of their own and sleep in bunks similar to berths in a stateroom on a steamer and where everything was arranged on a plan that would make an average man want to leave Chicago and try and duplicate the Huddard idea on some scale large or small.

Even Private Estate

Irrigation Requires Reservoirs

An interesting thing was the irrigation system supplied by a little concrete reservoir into which the water comes from the general irrigation system of that district and then is cleared of sediment by riffles on a plan invented by Mr. Huddard. The whole thing together with the piping which carries the water to all parts of the place did not cost over $300 and furnishes water for grass, flowers or fruit anywhere on the estate. It is a fascinating illustration of the application of irrigation to a private place. It bears out the statement made by the Denver Reservoir Irrigation Company as to the demand there is around Denver for irrigation for private purposes; a greater demand even than for water for orchards and farms. It was demonstrated on a small scale a fact with which few people are familiar, namely, that irrigation in this section requires reservoirs. The streams which furnish the water are fed by melting snows in the mountains. When in the middle of the summer the snow is all melted there is no water for the streams and hence no water for irrigation- except that which has been stored in reservoirs. Without storage water late crops must starve.

This, however, is anticipating facts which came out in the course of the investigation, but which I would never have been able to complete if I had permitted myself to linger everywhere as long as I did in the fascinating abode of the Huddards.

When we were once more whirling along Wheat Ridge, they pointed out the acres where raspberries, garden truck, apples, etc., are grown every year in abundance, making the land worth any where from $800 to $1,200 an acre.

Of course, before I struck any of these irrigation farms for which we were headed, I had to stop the machine again and take more pictures, this time of a tent city. The entrance was labeled "Evangelical German Lutheran Sanitarium."

Rosy-Cheeked, Bright-Eyed

Patients in a Tent City

Each tent was erected and furnished by someone whose name was attached, for instance, John P. Schaffer, Pittsburg; Mrs. Marie Starke of Arcadia, Michigan.

"How much does it cost to put up a tent completely furnished?" I asked Mr. J. F. Miller whom I found at the big brick building which is connected with the Sanitarium.

"One hundred and fifty dollars. That furnishes everything, including the bed, the steamer chairs, etc."

"How much does it cost to be a patient?" "Thirty dollars a month if you are able to wait on yourself. Forty dollars if confined to the bed and requiring attention."

nurses

I talked to several cheerful patients or -I couldn't tell which, their eyes were so bright and their cheeks so round and rosy. "I sold not long ago, my common farm that I had taken on a tree claim," said Mr. Armstrong, when we were again on the move. "I sold it for $2,500. All it cost me was sixteen dollars for tree claim expenses. I farmed it by proxy.

"I came here 12 years ago. All my land is under ditch.

"As to the products of the land here, if a gardner does not produce $200 per acre per year he is not doing good business. One man I know got $500 out of an acre of tomatoes last season. One does better with heavier crops. Sugar beets average 17 tons to the acre at $5.00 a ton."

He is the Owner of the

Celebrated "Financial Countess"

"I make a specialty of high bred Jerseys," and Mr. Parfet showed the writer "Financial Countess" a celebrated cow which is valued at about $10,000, and is breaking the world's record for production of milk and butter. In fact Mr. Parfet's Jerseys are regarded as almost as much source of local pride as the Moffatt road.

He also goes in for Leghorns and Plymouth Rocks stating, "70 of my hens produced 109 eggs in two days." "Does poultry pay?"

"Why, yes."

"On account of the production and the climate. so much sunshine here that poultry thrive. One gets good prices for both eggs and poultry in Denver."

"For instance?"

"Not less than twenty-five cents wholesale and thirty cents retail. I supply a good many clubs." Mr. Armstrong meanwhile had been making an expedition around the place and came back full of enthusiasm for the fowls and the cattle. He lead me out to get a nearer view. As we were admiring some of the ten thousand dollar cows, Mr. Parfet joined us again and said regarding the dairy products, "I sell about 280 pounds of butter a week in Denver and considerable buttermilk."

"Who buys most of the buttermilk, the Denver Club?" The Denver Club being a central point of Rocky Mountain hospitality, this was intended to be more or less of a joke but Mr. Parfet answered sober as a judge "Yes, the Denver Club consumes quite a lot of buttermilk."

And then he and Mr. Armstrong entered

into a comparison of milk production as authenticated by the Colorado Agricultural College. Mr. Parfet stroked the silken flanks of the "Financial Countess" as he remarked, "This cow is remarkable as having three milk wells. In nine months she has produced over ten thousand pounds of milk. The butter that we have sold from her in that time amounts to nearly $300. Her milk, skimmed milk and butter milk have a value during that period of about $49.00."

"Financial Countess" and

Rockefeller's "Financial King."

While I was admiring the source of all this lacteal wealth Mr. Parfet added that the Financial Countess' heifers sold for about five hundred dollars each before she made her present record, and that now they would be worth about one thousand dollars apiece, adding that in sixteen days she had produced 484.9 pounds of milk testing 6.6, and that she was sired by "Financial King," head of the Rockefeller herd at Tarrytown-with no explanation as to the connection between financial cows and Rockefeller, and adding that her dam was "Financial Queen."

"I would have paid to see this cow" said Mr. Armstrong, summarizing his admiration of the Parfet prodigy, and then we went out into the paddock or calflock, or whatever you would call it, where some dear little cowlets came up to be petted about the same as collie dogs do, thus adding one more touch of delight to the experiences of the trip.

Interior of a Metropolitan

Irrigation Farmer's Home

Then returning to the Parfet residence, we were persuaded to remain for luncheon and secured our first inside view of a typical Colorado farm house with its up-to-date bathroom, hardwood floors, telephone and electric light, the latter furnished by the Denver Gas and Electric Company.

While we were appreciating the rich cream and other local delicacies of the Parfet table, Mr. Parfet said, "land is worth $200 to $500 an acre all through this section; farther down it is worth from one to two thousand dollars an acre. I have land that I value at over $1,000 an acre, because it produces over $1,000 an acre per year."

After luncheon we enjoyed ourselves by looking at Mrs. Parfet's china, hand-painted by herself, and of a very high order of delicate art. We were also interested in a jardinere which was covered with gold which had been taken out of Clear Creek.

Then when we were about ready to start upon our way everybody was summoned to the front veranda where the field glasses were produced and a careful scrutiny was made of the distant mountains.

"There it is," finally exclaimed Mr. Parfet. "What?" I asked.

"The Moffat Road. See those little cuts in the mountain," and he handed me the glass to catch one more view of the one particular product of Colorado in which the whole population is most proudly interested.

Having secured Mr. Parfet's signature to the notes of the interview, we whirled along the road back again toward Denver, till we

came to District School house No. 14, which is a very creditable looking new building, on the second floor of which I found Mr. James Truelsen arranging the scenery for amateur theatricals. He is proud of having been potent in building the school, defeating the local coal trust and raising more onions than anybody else in Colorado.

Fifty Dollars a Ton

Not High for Onions

"I can sell five carloads of onions to one carload of any other man in the State and set the price," the Onion King said. "I have grown onions since 1885. I have gotten as high as sixty-five tons of good salable onions out of 2 acres of land." "How much are onions worth?"

"Fifty dollars a ton is not a high price. Onions however are a crop to which you must stick year after year, taking them as they

come in order to make a success. The supply regulates the market. I grow from 5 to 7 acres yearly."

While I was figuring up that he must at times get as high as $300 an acre for his onions, he went on to say, "I have picked a car of strawberries in a day off this land. I have water rights three hundred and sixtyfive days in the year from the natural spring on my place." Which statement bears upon the necessity of water being provided constantly throughout the season in order to get good crops.

"What do you consider a fair average production per acre for the land through here?" "Not less than $250. I have seen seasons when it averaged at least $700"

This Land is Worth

About $600 an Acre

"What do you consider land worth?" "Four hundred to $600 is a good fair average. I am living on a six acre tract which I rent and for which I have offered the owner $3,600. He refused it. I have 25 acres of valley land which I farm."

Then I got Mr. Truelsen's pretty Colorado schoolmam and the children to come out by the front fence and be photographed.

In the meantime he signed my notes for publication, adding as a last thought, "I get $900 a year from 2 acres of asparagus."

Then we whirled thirty or forty miles an hour across a country parallel to the foot hills, stopping in one place to make a photograph of a two-room concrete-block bungalow with a little veranda, two chimneys, one for the fire place and one for the kitchen, because this bungalow seems to typify the concentrated up-to-dateness and fascinations of economical irrigation home-making. Out in Colorado they manage to get little bits of places to live in at a very small price which are just as modern as you will find in the very best Eastern cities and have no resemblance whatever to the shacks or shanties usually associated with the frontier.

It is all farming on most advanced principles, minus the advanced expense, for they seem to offer all sorts of inducement out there to people who have brains and ability and by inducement I mean, not only the income the land yields in response to intelligent cultivation, but these dainty little homes, the telephone, the coal supply, the educational superior, moral, literary and social advantages which are universal, and all of which combine to make the region from Denver to Greeley about the most desirable spot on the Continent.

The Site of the Biggest

Reservoir in Colorado

Now I had been seeing a good many ditches, but I did not see any reservoirs, and I began to clamor for a reservoir.

"We will come to one after a while," said Mr. Armstrong. Eventually we swung up onto a high hill. He swept his hand to the Westward, "there is the site of the biggest reservoir that we have in Colorado," he said.

I looked far out across a beautful valley dotted with farms and in the center of it a schoolhouse.

"When this reservoir is completed that

schoolhouse will be thirty feet under water" he said.

We got out the camera. While it was being placed in position Mr. Armstrong pointed out at our feet the place where the great dam I will terminate. I looked out across a mile or so of valley to the hill beyond and then my vision swept the broad expanse where the blue waters of Standley Lake Reservoir will be sparkling in the sunshine when this greatest of Colorado's irrigation enterprises shall reach completion.

Down in the base of the valley already is a lake which is assisting to supply irrigation to the farms which are being served by the Denver Reservoir Irrigation Company's system, which I learned later already owns nine other reservoirs of large capacity and through the consolidation of several irrigating companies owns many miles of canals, with which it is now serving some 20,000

the seventh floor of the E. & C. Building, Curtis and 17th streets." And then, the photographer having done his best in the declining light, we once more were whirling down the country toward Madison Orchard, which is the famous Kountze farm, similar in character and reputation to the Lord Aberdeen Farm in British Columbia. Having visited the Aberdeen place, I was prepared for scientific setting forth of everything that pertains to up-to-date cultivation of fruit. I may say in passing that on the Aberdeen place that they think they do pretty well when they get $500 out of an acre of apples, or $10,000 out of 20 acres, and that the trees are all planted so many feet apart and in absolutely straight lines any way you look, with the soil under and between the trees kept entirely free from weeds, letting not an atom of vitality in the earth be sapped by other growth.

acres of land with sufficient water all through the season, while when the big reservoir is completed it will have a supply sufficient for 100,000 acres or more. This, of course, would be only sufficient for a part of the area that is waiting for up-to-date irrigation and therefore it looks as if the Denver Reservoir Irrigation Company would have the pick of producing propositions, supplying its water only to land on which the most profitable crops will be produced.

Mr. Armstrong said that the dam was about a mile across, that the reservoir would be about 140 feet deep and cover about 1,500 acres.

A Visit to the

Famous Kountze Farm

Mr. Armstrong suggested, "why don't you call on Mr. Fred Taylor, the general manager of the company. You will find him on

It is the theory of such men as Kountze and Aberdeen that fruit trees in order to reach their highest degree of success should not be hampered by letting the grass grow, or planting other crops between the rows. Most Methodical

and Scientific Cultivation

Of course it was a most methodical and scientific place that we swung into, and the buildings were all of that style expected when the owner is a millionaire. The manager lives in a fine bungalow with a office. at one end and arrived on the scene just in time to build a fire in the wood stove and answer my questions before dark.

"We have 316 acres in trees; 196 acres in apples, 105 in cherries, 15 in plums," he said. "Our land cost us to begin with $180 to $200. Today it is worth $1,000 an acre judged by the way it is selling around here. On an average in small tracts below us they are getting close to that for their land."