Page:Adventures in Thrift (1916).djvu/210

 the road, Mr. Ralph Peters, found on investigation that his road ran through territory which was without value, as the average American sees it—without lumber, without coal or minerals, without any great water power, without any opportunities for developing industrial plants of any sort. Half of this territory, lying within fifty or sixty miles of New York City, was a howling wilderness, selling at three or possibly six dollars an acre, and no one buying it.

"In 1905 he decided that the one hope of this part of Long Island lay in agricultural development. In the offices of his railroad was a man named H. B. Fullerton, who was in charge of the general advertising, taking photographs, issuing booklets of scenery, and so on. Such work had taken Mr. Fullerton practically all over the railroad's territory. Also, Mr. Fullerton had traveled all over America, and he said that the Long Island land showed the same undergrowth as he had seen in Cuba, New Mexico and sections of South America, where vegetables grow luxuriantly. He believed that Long Island could grow beans, asparagus, peas, po-