From Boom to Bust and on the way back to Boom

PLEASE READ THIS CAREFULLY. THIS IS IMPORTANT. When I returned from the army in Feb 1946, Brooten was a beautiful busy little town with 5000 customers and a main street full of small shops. It continued that way until in the early 1960’s when Mother Nature shut off our rain. There wasn’t enough for the crops. At the same time our government issued an agriculture program called the Soil Bank which offered farmers a 10 year lease for his farm for $10.00 per acre. 60% of the farmers took it, sold all their livestock and machinery at an auction sale and moved to a larger city to find a job. They sold their farm to a neighbor or to an investor, took the family and never returned. We lost many entire families.

As a result we lost 3000 customers, a crippling blow, and because of that we lost all of our small ‘main street’ shops; our movie theater, our Ford, Chevrolet, John Deere and International Harvester Dealers. We lost our newspaper, our doctor, dentist, veterinarian, our drug store and our creamery. We lost all four grain elevators and our depot. We lost everything that was important to our little city. This was a terrible blow for Brooten. THIS IS IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ IT AGAIN.

It took our think tank a few years to figure out a solution to this problem, but in the late 1960’s we discovered that there was a huge aquifer below us that could furnish water to irrigate our crops. A potential “Bonanza”! With help from the University of Minnesota agricultural department. We help monthly meetings, invited speakers, held tours, displays and educational seminars about irrigation and we were off and running. We were busy!

As a result, and because of our promotion, we now have 100,000 acres of our land irrigated. Farmers in the past who got 50 bushels of corn per acre from this same land now get 225 bushels per acre plus thousands of acres of garden crops such as sweet corn, sweet peas and potatoes. This area is now officially known as the “Bonanza Valley”.

About this same time, we got a second new hard surface lighted airport replacing our first airport which was turned into our Industrial Area. That area now hold eleven industries, one of them a freezing plant that hires 500 workers to work in the irrigated fields and in the plant itself. Homes were also built for them. There are now ten more industries that are all busy, important and growing in our Industrial Area.

Another one of our think tank groups developed a golf course which itself caused 45 new homes to be built, and we now have 100 new and used rental units.

We have a new airport, a golf course, a medical center, a newspaper, a bowling alley, a lumberyard, a developing steak house, a brand new bank building and many other things.

That shows you what PROMOTERS AND BOOSTERS have done for our fair city.

We now need a DEVELOPER that will buy a portion of land (it’s available), develop it and build homes. We are desperately short of living quarters.

Our brochure tells you what we now have and what we need. Look it over and help us. Please! We need your thinking and suggestions. This is IMPORTANT. Right Dave?