Improved Farm Land

Tall timber stood here once, here on a corn belt farm along the Monon.
Here the roots of a half-mile of trees dug their runners deep in the loam for a grip and a hold against wind storms.
Then the axemen came and the chips flew to the zing of steel and handle-the lank railsplitters cut the big ones first, the beeches and the oaks, then the brush.
Dynamite, wagons, and horses took the stumps-the plows sunk their teeth in-now it is first class corn land-improved property-and the hogs grunt over the fodder crops.
It would come hard now for this half mile of improved farm land along the Monon corn belt, on a piece of Grand Prairie, to remember once it had a great singing family of trees.