1913 International Dry Farming Congress in Tulsa

October 22, 1913, news story on International Dry Farming Congress in Tulsa

El Paso Herald reports on this major international conference that brought delegates and exhibits from 20 nations (including China, Russia, Roumania, and Turkestan) and all the western states. The exhibition grounds were on the east side of N Lewis Ave, between Archer and the Frisco tracks. The central focus of the exhibition's parallelogram shaped campus was the Oklahoma Kaffir Corn Palace. Kaffir Corn is known nowadays as sorghum. I wonder whether the building was decorated with kernels like the famed Corn Palace in Mitchell, S. D.

There's a display ad on the same page for the Sunset Limited, a daily train from El Paso to New Orleans (35 hours away) and New York (75 hours away) with oil-burning locomotives.

An item in the Pipeline & Gas Journal chides Tulsa for their plans to light the conference grounds at night with a pillar of fire generated by a natural gas well, with a pressure sufficient for a 600' high column of gas that, when lit, would be visible for 500 miles around, using 15 million cubic feet of gas per night.

Here's the Tulsa Star's coverage of the conference. And there's also an item on the front page mentioning a special pavilion exclusively for "colored farmers." (The Star was the leading paper for Tulsa's African-American community prior to the 1921 Race Riot.)