The Prune Booster's Return: 140 Acres Sold to Twenty Michigan Families

Mr. J. R. Chaplin left Olympia on the 29th day of October last on a combination visit of business and pleasure to the home of his boyhood in Adrian, Michigan. He returned to Olympia yesterday morning, and no one corroborates the utterance of a prominent Seattle man, Mr. J. W. Grambs, now at the Olympia, that "the Capital City is on top" with more forceful and emphatic truthfulness than does Mr. Chaplin in the statement made by him to a TRIBUNE reporter who found him in his office in the Woodruff block this morning.

"I went direct from here," said Mr. Chaplin, "to Adrian, thence to Ray, Columbiaville, Mayville, Yale, Port Huron, Jeddo, Otsego and Detroit, all in the state of Michigan. In these nine towns I disposed of 140 acres of land and as a consideration received $150 per acre. The purchasers of this are comprised of 20 families, residents respectively of the several towns mentioned, and each family, or its head, secured a five-acre tract of the 140 acres. This land is located on the Westside, just west of what is known as the Congregational college grounds. I am directed by the parties who now own this property to slash and clear it at once, and to insure lightning action they have advanced sufficient funds for that purpose. This work will have been accomplished by early spring, when the majority of these families will arrive in Olympia as permanent residents and at once begin the laying out and propagating of prunes. You are not unaware," interjected Mr. Chaplin, "that the prune industry is no new idea in this country and especially about Olympia. Mr. Robt. Whitman has five acres under cultivation on the Eastside—a source of prolific profit. Mr. Edmund Rice also has ten acres on the Westside. If I am not mistaken both of these industries yield to the owners a matter of $200 net per acre per annum. I found no trouble in imbuing the people whom I met in Michigan with the fact that it would be hard to find a more remunerative industry than that to be derived from the planting of prunes."

"I also found the desire to be general among the farming and professional element to seek green fields and pastures new. They fail to appreciate the bright sunshine and a bracing atmosphere, with the mercury flirting with the bulb of the thermometer. Among the buyers of the five-acre tracts from me are men who only await reliable information in regard to this state. I could not personally, as a matter of course, see every one.

"The people I speak of want reliable information through personal contact with individuals direct from Washington.

"If the state, and more especially Olympia, ever had a golden opportunity to increase her population, her number of residences and her general welfare, it is here, now within her grasp. My idea in this connection is that the city should send some responsible, energetic, educated man East at once in furtherance of the success that met my trip. I would suggest the organization of—say, we'll call it the Olympia Improvement Company, with a given amount of stock; float it in the East. Those holding shares there would be enabled to realize benefit by their own improvements. All of the five-acre tract holders would take stock. If one is aware that a certain improvement is anticipated, naturally one would take advantage of the information."

Mr. Chaplin said in substance, in conclusion, that he was most desirous of having a meeting of the business men of the city for the purpose of taking immediate steps in the way of putting the resources of the state with forcible truth before, particularly, the people of Michigan. Mr. Chaplin was most impressively enthusiastic throughout the statement of facts as given, and finished by saying "we only want to be known to be wealthy."