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Show jHundreds Inspect I Big Swamp Project i i j Some 800 citizens of the eour.ty, I as well as ninny dipvitaries from j the capital city, attended the dedication dedi-cation of the Manti-Ephraim swamp j reclamation project held, at Ephraim j last Saturday. Visitors from Gun-j Gun-j niscn were June Metcalf, county j commissioner, J. M. Knighton and ;A. E. Park. Others from Gunnison j had planned on being present but .were unavoidably detained at home, i Governor Geo. II. Dcrn and a party I of soil and plant specialists from the I Utah Agricultural college wee j a'nong those attending from outside j points. Following a close inspection of the swamp area by the governor and the party of specialists, the meeting was carried to Ephraim and further sponsoring spon-soring of the movement were heard ! at a largely attended meeting at the j tabernacle at Ephraim, at which time. ! a splendid banquet was served, the j Ephraim citizens being hosts. ; The swamp project has a lengthy 1 history. Thirty-five years ago mark-led mark-led the first attempt to make the j swamp land tillable. The effort then j was on the part of a few land owners in one corner cf the swamp. It was a failuic, because the drainage system sys-tem was not large enough to handle surplus moisture from the entire area of peat or bog land. These peat , lands, from two to- twenty feet deep, are extensive in the county. From that beginning until 102-1, the opening of the last and successful success-ful attempt, many attempts wre made to organize a drainage district for the swamp region. In 102-1 such a district was organized under the then new state drainage law. '"his district embraced nil of the peat lands between Ephraim and M ;iti and. measured 4200 acres. Immediately following orgMrin-!;tion orgMrin-!;tion of this district a bond election was called and $30,000 of bonds were I voted. The contract was awar. d ! for drainage canal construction. I Only 300 acres were drained -piitii-e-1 ly, and on these acres an experiment ; was conducted durng the past sum-imcr. sum-imcr. About two dozen different 1 kinds of crops were grown succers-I succers-I fully. ; Drainage of the land is accomplished accom-plished by a system of open cnnalu, so there will be no trouble with them i in the future, and the expense of ! cleaning out weeds will be very ' small . I The best agrieulturistsof the st-nto j have visited this district during the-j the-j past two years and have pronounce'! jit the riches land in the state. It is i especially adapted to intensive faim-!ing. faim-!ing. Such crops as celery, head lct-I lct-I tuce, cabbage, asparagus, cauliflow-' cauliflow-' er can be grown. When these hinds ' are reclaimed they will help support I Sanpete county's sugar factories and j canneries, and will add thousands of I people .to the county's population, j During the summer of 1927 Jic j whole 4200 acres in the district will , ! be drained and likely another rhs- trict will be formed, , embracing the 13000 acres north of the present district. |