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Jefferson County

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Jefferson County, Mississippi

   Agriculturally & Industrially

by M. C. Harper, 1904


Jefferson county is situated in southwest Mississippi.

Within its borders are found hills and valleys of unsurpassed fertility. Its climatic conditions are almost perfect.

Near enough to the Gulf of Mexico for its winters to be tempered, and to be cooled in summer by the breezes that come ladened with refreshing moisture.

The Mississippi river making a grand sweep westward, flows in a great curve around its western border, and forms thousands of acres of alluvial lands that are the finest in the world for cotton and corn.

Rising from these bottom lands are the celebrated Gulf Hills, where cane brakes become jungles and where the magnolia and the poplar attain their most perfect growth making the balmy air sweet with their perfumes

Among these hills fortunes have been made, palatial homes have been built, and contentment has reigned supreme.

Here, with proper care, lands are made to produce remunerative crops after fifty years constant cultivation. Here cotton and corn grow to perfection, the various grasses flourish luxuriantly, and stock raising is becoming an important industry.

Bee culture is most successfully developed on the bluffs above the river bottoms. They find in the lynn trees on the hills the richest of material, and the willows in the bottoms afford an inexhaustible supply of honey-producing flowers.

The two forks of Coles Creek run nearly through the entire length of the county, and their broad valleys, together with those of the numerous streams tributary to them, and. the ridge lands skirting them are dotted with farms whose owners are independent and prosperous.

The eastern part of the county, reaching into the long leaf pine regions that have made South Mississippi famous in recent years, is still affording much valuable timber and settled by the descendents of sturdy Scotch families, is divided into numerous small farms whose owners are thrifty, self-reliant and prosperous.

Several sawmills are getting out, preparing the timbers of this section for market, and find a ready sale for their products. Splendid schools, a high moral and religious tone among its people, and good lands, worked thoroughly, make this a most desirable part of the county to live in. They who are looking for locations in the South, will find Jefferson county a most satisfactory section to invest in.

The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley railroad runs through its central part, and this is intersected by the Natchez branch of the Illinois Central, afford splendid facilities for the transportation of garden products, which, grow splendidly and mature early.

Bermuda and other grasses flourish in abundance, affording rich pastures for stock, and we believe, in a few years our herds of shorthorn, Hereford, Devon, and other breeds of cattle, will rival those of any of the Western States. Two to three tons of hay to the acre are frequently cut from the Bermuda meadows, and a bale of cotton or forty bushels of corn per acre are not uncommon. Sugar cane does well, and the purest and best of molasses can be made, and many of our: farmers supply themselves entirely with most delicious syrup. Three cotton-seed oil mills furnish employment for many laborers and much of their product Is used in fattening cattle for market.

By the rotation of crops and the planting of the celebrated cowpea as a fertilizer, our lands need never wear out, as the old lands by this method can be brought back to a high state of production.

To this promising and balmy land of the South all good comers are doubly welcome. Churches, good schools and a most hospitable citizenship are here to receive you; a fertile soil is here to respond to your industry, and a genial climate Is here to give you health and long life.

We need more population, and our lands divided into smaller farms can afford homes for thousands of families, and these lands can be bought at prices ranging from $5 to $20 per acre.

Large tracts can be bought and divided into homes for colonies, and thus social, religious and school advantages can be established for themselves. No where does nature do more for man and by thrift and reasonable care almost anyone can become comfortable in a few years.

To this county we cordially ask the stranger to come and make his home.



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