Boone County Farmers Interested in Farm Topics

     During the year 1917 the Secretary of State for Nebraska issued 148,101 automobile licenses. There is an automobile in Nebraska for each 8.2 of the population.
      The Nebraska permanent school fund contains nearly $10,000,000 in interest bearing securities. And the school lands of Nebraska are valued at not less than $24,000,000.
      Others may claim the distinction, but Nebraska can prove that a smaller proportion of her children under 14 years of age are working in factories and stores than any other state.
      Banner, Arthur, McPherson, Loup and Keya Paha counties are the only Nebraska counties without railroads. Garfield and Wheeler each have less than ten miles of railroad.
      During the twenty-year period ending with 1915 Nebraska ranked third among the corn producing states, third among the wheat producing states, and fourth among the oats producing states.
      The value of Nebraska property used for school purposes is $22,000,000. Total amount expended for school purposes in 1916 was in excess of $10,092,000. The per capita expenditure of average attendance was $47.14.
      The hydro-electric possibilities of Nebraska are practically unlimited, although as yet but scantily developed. The Loup river is said by competent engineers to be the most stable stream in the United States.

      Nebraska has 6,179 miles of railroad, not including double track. The Burlington mileage is 2,850, Union Pacific 1,184, Northwestern 1,071, Rock Island 245, Minneapolis & Omaha 306, Omaha Bridge & Terminal 371.
      Five counties in southeastern Nebraska - Richardson, Otoe, Nemaha, Cass and Johnson - produce more apples than any one state west of the Missouri river. The orcharding possibilities of eastern Nebraska are without limit.
      The State School Lands may not be sold, but are held in trust for the benefit of the school children and leased advantageously. The revenues from these School Lands are divided pro-rata among the counties of the state for school purposes.
      The per capita consumption of sugar in the United States is eighty-three pounds per year. Nebraska annually produces that much per capita and about twenty pounds per capita more. There are four beet sugar mills in Nebraska. located at Grand Island, Bayard, Scottsbluff, and Gering.
      The United States Geological Survey's report for 1915 estimates the value of the mineral products of the United States in that year to be $992,000,000. Nebraska has no mines, but in that year she produced two-thirds of that enormous value from her soil crops, live stock, dairy and poultry yards.
      The farm value of Nebraska's agricultural products in 1916 was more than the mine mouth value of all the bituminous coal mined in the United States in the same year. Add live stock values thereto and the total exceeds the mine mouth value of the total output of bituminous and anthracite.
      Cherry, the largest county in Nebraska, contains more square miles than either Connecticut, Delaware or Rhode Island, and is more than seventy-one times larger than the District of Columbia. If the earth's population is 1,500,000,000, as estimated, every man, woman and child could stand in Cherry county and have a space two feet square.

     Nebraska is in the general path of the low pressure, or storm, areas that move across the United States from west to east. The important factors in determining its climate are, first, the distance from the equator, because the heat received from the sun is greater at the equator and decreases northward; second, the altitude, or elevation above sea level, because the higher locations have lower temperature; third, the distance and direction from the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic ocean, because the supply of moisture from rain and snow comes mainly from these larger bodies of water; fourth, the Rocky Mountains, located near the western boundary, because they have an important effect upon both temperature and moisture.
      January is the coldest month, with a mean temperature of 25 degrees in the southeast and 20 degrees or a little below in the north. February is

Cattle Judging Exhibition at Dannebrog, Nebr.

almost as cold, averaging about 3 degrees warmer, while December is next, with an average of but 2 degrees higher than February. While the coldest weather of the year may occur in any of these three winter months, it is most likely to occur in January, and it most frequently occurs in the last half of that month. In the coldest days of winter the temperature usually falls to between 10 and 20 degrees below zero.
     The latest that a killing frost has occurred in most of the state is May 27. This was in 1907, when the freezing temperature covered most of the southern and eastern counties. In the northwestern part of the state such severe frosts have occurred in June, and in 1902 one occurred on June 21. The last killing frost, it will be observed, happens as a rule in the southeastern section in the last ten days of April, but comes gradually later northward and westward, occurring near May 1 in the greater portion of the southern and eastern sections and from May 10 to 15 in the more elevated portions in the north and west..
     The average annual precipitation for the state as a whole is 23.67 inches. Most of this is rain, the snowfall for the year averaging only about 25 inches, equal to nearly two and one-half inches of water, or about one-tenth the annual precipitation..
     The year is divided into wet and dry seasons. May, June and July constitute the wet season with 46 per cent of the annual amount, while Novem-