Unimportant MARION (just from the telephone)-"He wanted to know if we would go to the theater with him, and I said we would." MADELEINE "Who was speaking?" MARION "Oh, gracious! I forgot to ask." -Judge. A Natural Question A FOUR-YEAR-OLD listened attentively while his mother sang: "They have fitted a slab of granite so gray, "And sweet Alice lies under the stone." "Was she mashed, mama?" he asked.Everybody's. Getting It All THE DOCTOR told him he needed carbohydrates, proteids, and above all, something nitrogenous. The doctor mentioned a long list of foods for him to eat. He staggered out and wabbled into a Penn Avenue restaurant. "How about beefsteak?" he asked the waiter. "Is that nitrogenous?" The waiter didn't know. "Are fried potatoes rich in carbohydrates or not?" The waiter couldn't say. "Well, I'll fix it," declared the poor man in despair. "Bring me a large plate of hash." -Pittsburg Post. Revenge LANDLADY "You believe in mustard plasters, doctor?" M. D.-"Rather! I always order them for patients who call me out in the middle of the night when there's nothing the matter with WHERE ELECTRICITY COMPETES WITH COAL By RANDALL R. HOWARD T is being demonstrated by the Federal Government on the Minidoka Government Reclamation project in Idaho that electricity can compete with coal for heating and cooking purposes. Of course, conditions are especially favorable, for this project has what is stated to be the largest water pumping plant in the world. A total of ten thousand electrical horsepower is available during the summer months for lifting water for the irrigation of forty-eight thousand acres of land. But this great quantity of electrical energy is not needed during the remaining eight months of the year. Hence it is being sold by the Reclamation Service to the settlers on the project, for light, for heat, and for other domestic uses. The Government does not purpose to make a profit from the sale of this surplus electricity, and the winter heating rate is extremely low-one dollar per kilowatt month. This amounts to about thirteen-hundredths of one cent per kilowatt hour while an ordinary rate for electricity from private companies in cities is a maximum charge of fifteen cents and a minimum charge of five cents per kilowatt hour. The winters are rather severe in this part of the West, but the Government rate enables the settler to heat an ordinary room for a total annual cost of between ten and fifteen dollars. The settlers are encouraged to allow their electric heaters to burn all night, since the loads on the generators at the big power plant will be more equalized. Thus, the householder will have the luxury of a warm room when he arises on a cold winter morning. He also will find hot water for coffee, and his oatmeal ready cooked. The electrical transmission system has not yet been extended to all parts of the project, but where it is extended, even the most humble shacks and tents may be lighted and heated with electricity. Ordinarily, electrical appliances for heating and cooking are considered extreme luxuries, since the first cost of such household furnishings is usually very high. But on the Minidoka project this condition has been met by developing working models for the manufacture of cheap stoves for heating and cooking. With the aid of these models a handy man about the farm may make his own electric stove. If he does not have the materials, or is not handy, the village tinsmith can do the job cheaply. True, these stoves betray that they are homemade, but they are efficient and can be made attractive enough even for a fastidious town or country housewife. When the transmission lines shall have been extended to all parts of the project, this cheap electrical energy will have many other uses than for heating and cooking. A certain amount of cheap power will be available even during the summer months, and electrical fans will not be a luxury in the farm houses-to say nothing about churns, feed choppers, and wood saws. This unique electrical power plant that is competing with coal has a most strategic location. A considerable part of the regular water flow from the Snake River had already been appropriated to use when the engineers of the Reclamation Service located the dam site for the large Minidoka project. This water was being taken from the river at a lower point, hence must be allowed to escape the Government dam which raises the WHERE ELECTRICITY COMPETES WITH COAL 755 surface of the river thirty-five feet. But there was nothing to prevent Uncle Sam from stripping this appropriated water of its power, as it passed through his Minidoka dam. Accordingly, the largest power plant of the Reclamation Service was constructed, developing five units of two thousand horsepower each. The engi neers did not stop here, planning to play the game for all it was worth. ONE OF THE PUMPING STATIONS. DIVERSION DAM IN THE SNAKE RIVER. The water pumping system on the Minidoka project is already the largest on the continent. It is stated that the second largest pumping plant is a part of the city drainage system of New Orleans. But the Minidoka giant pumping plant does not suffer in comparison, for the city pumps at the other corner of the continent are said to lift only about onehalf the amount of water raised by a single one of the three different pumping stations on the Minidoka project. The Each of these three pumping stations lift the water approximately thirty feet. The sight is indeed most strange-to see wide canals of water flowing abruptly into the side of a ridge. water disappears at the edge of low cement buildings, where the continuous whirr of machinery may be heard. But several hundred feet away, and farther up the ridge, streams again boil up like great springs, and are carried off in concrete-lined canals. The first pumping station is thirteen miles from the Minidoka dam; and the second and the third are respectively a mile and a quarter, and a mile and a half from the first station. Some of the rural residents of Idaho are said to have been highly skeptical that the slight copper wires would be able to lift the stream of water from the canal, when the giant pumping plants were dedicated, and they came for miles to see such a remarkable wonder as this. Their doubts were The power plant was so constructed that its capacity may be doubled, should the need arise. A great deal of water goes to waste during the spring flood flow of the Snake River, and it was gambled that the time will come when a part of this water will be stored and conserved for irrigation. When that time does come, the Minidoka dam will strip more water of its power, and more electrical energy will be available for summer irrigation and to compete with coal during the W By HARLAN D. SMITH HAT C. D. Robinson of Pawnee City, Nebraska, did with catalpas was nothing unusual but it is a good instance to cite because it shows what any farmer can do on a small piece of land. This is according to C. A. Scott, State Forester of Kansas. Mr. Robinson harvested a small crop of twenty acres not long ago. His profit was $152.17 an acre, or $3,043.40 for the entire crop. This was above interest on his investment for sixteen years at five per cent. In establishing, maintaining, and harvesting his grove, Mr. Robinson hired everything done and paid good wages. He could easily have done most of the work himself at odd times and saved one-half the expense. Nobody knows how many millions of rich acres in the Missouri Valley remain idle year after year because of spasmodic those high water. Count only those acres lying close to river and creek banks very uncertain areas that are excellent farm land one day and a river bed the next-and you'll have a good many millions in your estimate. Yet on this very waste land a new and profitable industry will start some of these days. It will be catalpa growing. The ever-increasing demand for catalpa posts and poles will bring it about. Catalpa growing is not a get-richquick scheme. Requiring eight to sixteen years for a crop to mature, it isn't a quick investment. But there is mighty good money in catalpa growing and where the soil is good it is practically an absolutely safe investment. Some Kansas catalpa plantations are being harvested now with promises of large profits. Charles Delker, of Hudson, who has one hundred thousand trees, is cutting posts which he says will bring |