NEBRASKA AS IT SHOULD BE KNOWN
A Paper read before the Nebraska Press Association at Omaha by Will M. Maupin, and republished in order to
supply a demand that soon exhausted last week's edition, to say nothing of 2,000 copies in pamphlet form.
We of Nebraska should know, and
knowing tell all the world, what Ne
braska is and is to be; what Nebraska
offers to the houieseeker, the investment
seeker and the health seeker; what hid
den potentialities for human happiness
lie dormant in her fertile soil, and what
she is annually contributing to the sum
total of the world's created wealth.
In the beginning of this necessarily
brief paper I want to say, and say em
phatically, that the last session of the
Nebraska legislature, which performed
many good deeds, neglected the ripest
opportunity ever offered a legislature to
confer a las ting benefit upon the state.
I refer to its failure and neglect to make
the initial appropriation for a Bureau
of Publicity and Immigration. There
was no reasonable ground for opposi
tion to the measure; no reasonable ob
jection in economy. In fact there was
no opposition to the bill. But, unfor
tunately, it did not offer opportunities
for log-rolling and trading. It had be
hind it the solid backing of every enter
prising organization in the state, of
every wide-awake man who is anxious
to see Nebraska take her rightful place
among the states of the republic. But
because legislation today has become
largely a matter of "You tickle me and
I'll tickle you;" so largely a matter of
trade and barter, this splendid measure
calculated to give us a start in the great
work of making the truth about Ne
braska known to the world, was allowed
to die of inanition, of mal-nutrition, of
sheer neglect. And in doing so the leg
islature worked a grave injury to the
commonwealth.
States, like corporations and partner
ship and firms must advertise in these
strenuous days or fall to the rear. Con
stant, persistent, insistent, intelligent
advertising is the keynote of success in
any business, and there is no greater or
more important business than the build
ing of a state.
But there is a condition precedent to
intelligent advertising. The constructor
of the advertising must know what he is
advertising. No man engaged in adver
tisement building can hope ever to know
too much about the business or the
goods he is exploiting. It is all well
enough for the newspaper men of Ne
braska to claim that they are constantly
advertising Nebraska, but the plain, un
varnished truth is that they are not do
ing it as it should be done, and for the
very simple reason that they do not know
all they should know about Nebraska.
I have lived in this state for a quarter of
a century longer by several years than
the average Nebraska editor. I have
tried in my weak way to advertise Ne
braska to the world, and I thought for
years I knew Nebraska pretty thorough
ly. Something like six years ago I be
gan studying Nebraska from a different
angle. Formerly I had studied it from
a car window or in political conventions
or by converse with friends in my office.
Now, after studying Nebraska for six
years as any merchant studies his stock
any successful merchant, I mean I
have just begun to realize that what I
knew of Nebraska up until six years
ago was as nothing, and that if I keep
on acquiring knowledge for the next six
or eight years as I have during the past
six or eight, at the .end of that time my
knowledge of this great state may qual
ify me to emerge from the kindergarten
class and enter the first primary. The
longest span of human life in this age
would not suffice to enable one to grad
uate from the great school wherein
knowledge of Nebraska is imparted.
Merely as a basis upon which to work
intelligently while you study, I purpose
giving you some concrete facts about
our beloved state. I will not waste your
time in detailing bald statistics. The
average human mind can not think in
millions. Statistical tables appeal only
to statisticians. Columns of figures
frighten and repel the average man. Be
cause of this I undertook, while serving
as chief of the statistical bureau of the
state, to present the statistics about Ne
braska in a more attractive form than
the usual table of figures. I hope I may
be pardoned if I lay claim to having
achieved some measure of success in ad
vertising Nebraska abroad. I am of the
opinion that the crop statistics of Ne
braska, and all other statistics, received
a wider range of publicity under the
plan I adopted than they had achieved
before. One bulletin of comparative
statistics reached a circulation of 70,000
with requests for upwards of 250,000
more. And such great journals as Col
lier's, Leslie's Weekly, Munsey's Maga
zine, The American Magazine and the
Cosmopolitan, to say nothing of the
great daily newspapers, gave free to Ne
braska a measure of publicity that could
not have been purchased with money.
Now, here are some facts about Ne
braska, tersely told, that will serve as
the basis for many a good advertisement
of Nebraska:
Nebraska was admitted to the union
in March, 18G7, and is therefore forty
four years old six years less than half
a century. All this progress, all this
wonderful development, has been
wrought in less than fifty years. Civil
ization's history records nothing like it.
Seventy-seven thousand square miles
of territory, 415 miles east and west and
205 miles north and south. Forty-nine
million acres, eighteen million acres cul
tivated. Upon these eighteen million cul
tivated acres Nebraska in 1910 raised
upwards of f 400,000,000 worth of grains
and grasses. Of the thirty million uncul
tivated acres more than one-half are just
as good for corn, wheat, oats, rye, barley,
alfalfa, potatoes, broom corn, etc., as the
eighteen million cultivated acres, and
one-half of the remaining acreage will in
time, under intelligent cultivation and
proper knowledge of the conditions to be
met, be added to the wealth producing
area. It took Nebraskans more than a
quarter of a century to learn that they
could not adapt Nebraska soil, to the Ne
braska man. Then came the most won
derful discovery of the age the discov
ery that by adapting the man to the soil,
Nebraska could be made the greatest ag
ricultural wealth producer in the world.
Since that discovery every year has seen
hundreds of thousands of acres of soil,
heretofore considered worthless, brought
into cultivation and yielding returns that
are so astonishing that it is hard to make
people believe the truth. There is room
in Nebraska for a half million more till
ers of the soil who will till intelligently.
Landseer, when asked what he mixed his
paints with, replied, "With brains !", And
there is no better fertilizer than brains.
Nebraska is the third largest corn pro
ducing state, and the youngest of the
three, raising more corn to the acre than
any other state.
Nebraska is the fourth largest wheat
producing state, and the youngest of the
three, raising more wheat to the acre than
any other state.
Nebraska is the fourth largest pro
ducer of oats, and the youngest of the
four, only one state excelling her in pro-:
duction per acre.
Nebraska is the third largest producer
of sugar beets.
Nebraska manufactures more butter
per capita than any other state, and her
dairy industry is in its infancy.
- Nor is Nebraska alone an agricultural :
and live stock state. Twenty-five years
. ago we shipped in practically every man-
ufactured article we consumed. Last
year our total manufactured products
were approximately worth $250,000,000,
or almost one-half as much as our total
of agricultural products and live stock.
Startling as it may sound, there is no
state making such rapid strides in manu
facturing lines as Nebraska. There is a
reason. A dollar invested in Nebraska
manufacturing establishments brings a
greater return than "a dollar invested in;
any other state.
But, as I said early in this paper, the
human mind cannot think in terms of
millions. If I say that in 1910 Nebraska
produced 36,000,000 pounds of butter we
merely smile and say, "that's some but-