This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Bechtel, Liggett Classification: Lookup Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/ok.2ADE/4183 Message Board Post: THE FREMONT COUNTY SUN. July 18, 1895. "IOWA APPLES".-- M. J. M. Bechtel has received a sample shipment of fruit grown upon his orchard near Hamburg, Fremont county, this state, which establishes the fact beyond question that Iowa is a fruit growing state of the first class. The consignment includes Red June, Dutchess of Oldenburg, Early Harvest and Red Astrchan apples and a peach, named unknown, of fine color and appearance. 1891 is the last year that Iowa produced a heavy fruit crop. In that year there were shipped from points along the Burlington route 249,758 barrels or 1,665 car loads of apples. In 1894 there was a small crop, amounting, according to the shipments, to 68,205 barrels. This year the harvest is expected to equal, if not exceed, that of 1891, and the quality of the fruit as shown by the samples received is of the very highest. The Burlington road has done everything in its power to encourage fruit growing along its lines, and those who have pursued this course are in a fair way to reap handsome rewards.--Burlington Hawkeye. N.B.: My grandfather, Walter Scott Liggett (1869 - 1959), told of how the loess bluffs around 1900 were nicknamed "The Apple Hills". As I remember, he said the idea of growing apples died out because the ground used for orchards turned in a greater profit when used for growing grain.--W.F.