Newspapers / The Pinehurst Outlook (Pinehurst, … / Nov. 1, 1919, edition 1 / Page 9
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^NOVEMBER, 1919 PAGE SEVEN The Destiny of the Sandhill Country By BION H. BUTLER* I HE phenomenal development of Moore county continues at a rate that astonishes everybody famil iar with it. It is doubtful if anywhere in the South is anything on the same scale, and the signs all point to a fur ther movement that will make the present look like child’s play. In the last three or four weeks many -thousand acres of land have changed hands, and the prices paid are such that others besides me have taken a second look. This year the Buchan •orchard of forty acres sold peaches -enough to more than pay the cost of the thing, and last week an option on the place for $12,000 was bought by L. L. Johnson. This is three times what the whole 2,000 acre tract was of fered for about twenty years ago, and the whole farm has made close to $75,000 worth of stuff this year. James Swett half a dozen years ago bought less than 200 acres of land near Ni- TF Eeminiscent of the Old South agara and planted an orchard and built plans that will govern tho North Carolina, where he gets climate :a house. The place has long ago paid whole unit. with his land, and he does not mind for itself, but he sold it few days ago gy eastern boundary of paying a few thousand dollars for a "to Lee Page for $30,000. And three ^i^g Lindley property is reached few acres of land in a climate that he miles away the government is protesting pomes the six thousand acres bought by regards as perfection. A thousand dol- that the people whose land is taken for ^ Page, Jr., from the Von Herf lars means an interest charge of sixty Camp Bragg are profiteering when property. Mr. Page has a force of men dollars a year, and sixty dollars does they ask ten dollars an acre. on land making roads, and he not look like money to him when he can In the last two or three weeks a will build miles of improved road put his family and himself in a climate scheme has been talked over to con- throughout the entire territory. His like that of the Sandhills. :nect up all the territory from west of roads will connect with the Pinehurst Then there is another advantage. He Pinehurst to east of Southern Pines, in roads where his land joins the Van finds that his friends are locating in a distance of about ten miles, and Lindley orchard property, and he will the same neighborhood, and his land has make of it a continuous park. This is carry the scheme through to Manly and the added value to him of location, the most pretentious and at the same Southern Pines, and the same idea of Location is what makes land worth mil time the most simple proposition I have five and ten acre building lots to sell lions along Wall street and nothing up ever heard of of its kind. It is pre- to high-class buyers will prevail. For a in Labrador, although both may have tentious for it includes twenty thousand distance of ten miles probably this road the same acreage. A Moore county acres of land and the big resorts of system will extend through the district, locatign is convenient to five or six both Pinehurst and Southern Pines, and it will be located at such advanta- eighteen-hole golf courses, with more hundreds of acres of the best peach geous points that the best features of to be built, and that is worth money orchards in this section, and the con- the landscape will be emphasized. to the Northern man who is hunting a struction of miles of road, and the The success of the venture is always winter home in the climate belt. He building of innumerable new homes, its important phase. But this is not figures that when he picks his location. Yet it is a simple proposition, for the one that is worrying the men back of And that he is among people of his own land has all been gathered into strong this thing, for before the proposiion habits and from his own section adds hands favorable to the scheme, and they had been publicly announced the ru- more to the location, so he willingly are not only going to carry it through, mors of it had passed around sufficient- adds on a little more to get what he but they will make a lot of money out ly that numerous inquiries for locations wants. Also he figures here is a place •of it, and make the vast park the prince on the new avenues had come in from that can be reached within one night’s -of resorts and one of the most elaborate all directions, and before he has one run from New York, which is another fruit developments in the United States, of the lots marked off yet ready for feature. It is only a short run in his Beginning at Pinehurst and running sale. Mr. Page has a pocket-ful of car, and over good roads and roads that ■out toward the famous Van Lindley letters from all over the country, even are getting better every day, and it is a •orchard which has been bought by as the Pacific coast, asking about location with good roads all around it. Pinehurst interests, a pair of avenues his scheme. Location makes values, will be built, one for eastbound traffic The Sandhill county is just waking Then comes this peach business. A and the other for the other direction, up to the fact that it has two or three bearing peach tree is worth from two This will mean two broad avenues fit things that people with money are will- to three dollars now, and as it will for any kind of traffic, and broad ing to pay for. These things include bring that much from its crop in one •enough to handle all of it. Between first of all the incomparable climate, year the value is not high. Two hun- the two broad roads will be a park, and If a Wall street broker could buy with- dred trees to the acre means that an on the outside of each of them will be in fifty miles of New York five acres acre of bearing orchard is worth from ■parks, and outside of the parks walks of land with the Moore county climate $400 to $600, and that seems to be for foot passengers. The pair of ave^ he would not hesitate a minute to give about 'the price that peach men are look- nues will be fronted with homes built ten thousand dollars an acre for it. He ing on as a fair thing. The peach by winter visitors to this section on can get all the land he wants up there orchard looks like something interesting tracts of land that will run five and ten somewhere ,in New York or Eastern to the Northern newcomer, and he is acres to the lot. These lots will be Pennsylvania for a small handful of dropping his money into hundreds of sold with building restrictions, and the pocket change, but in winter he can’t acres of it. It is a fact that nowhere on 'type of buildings will be in keeping dig it out of the snow. So he heads for earth makes finer peaches than the North Carolina Sandhills, and they bring the prices, for they go into market at a time when nothing else is there^ and they are so close to the markets that they get there in good shape. A peach orchard that has been planted five years and has not paid for itself to the last cent is not rated as a very success ful plant in the Sandhills. After that it is all velvet if it is cared for right, and most of them are. So peaeh orchards are worth money, and peaeh land is attractive to the investor. It may surprise you, but a good peaeh location could easily stand to pay $500 for an acre of wild land, for that means only thirty dollars a year interest, and crops that will bring maybe a thousand dollars an acre can easily afford to pay interest amounting to sixty. It is not wholly climate that makes the Sandhills a peach country. It is the hills. The ridges are between six and seven hundred feet above tidewater, as shown by the United States coast sur vey work last summer in the region. The valleys drop off two or three hun dred feet lower. The result is an air drainage that just fits the peach. Cool nights in the spring, cold air drains from the ridges to the valleys, and the trees in blossom on the ridges are not hurt by frost as the cold air has gone into the valleys, and theie the frost line is shown by the blackened vegitation. while on the ridges everything is as green as in summer. That spring frost line caused by the air drainage of the hills is the life of the Sandhills peaeh proposition, and it is worth a lot of money to every acre of peach land. Peach men do not hesitate to pay it. On account of this peculiarity of safe ty from spring frosts the Sandhill county is destined to be a vast succes sion of peach orchards, for the in dustry is expanding faster right now than at any previous time and on a broader and more systematic basis. Climate was the first thing that was discovered to have a value in the Sand hill county. Then having found cli mate, location gradually grew to be worth money, and is growing more valu able every day. With that has come the hill topography. I omit the minor influences like tobacco, dewberries, and other factors like that, which help, for the first three are the big forces. They are making the lands of Moore county take on these phenomenal prices, and I do not think it is to be a great while until Moore county land will be priced higher than any other rural property in tho State. I expect within the next two years to see land two miles from a postoffice or railroad station go on the books at the recorder’s office at a thou- spnd dollars an acre, and more than that would not surprise me. *From the Raleigh News and Observer
The Pinehurst Outlook (Pinehurst, N.C.)
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Nov. 1, 1919, edition 1
9
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