In a country such as ours where corn, cotton, wheat, and oats are such valuable field crops, we are likely to overlook other important products of the soil. Take potatoes, for example. In 1915 our total potato production was 359,103,000 bushels. If all these potatoes were put in half-bushel measures, and these were set side by side, they would make 6 rows around the earth. Another way of understanding in the value of our potato crop is to consider the acreage. In 1915, 3,761,000 acres were planted in potatoes. The total value of the crop was about $215,000,000. Minnesota led all other states in 1915 in the production of potatoes with more than 30,000,000 bushels. Wisconsin was second with almost 25,000,000 bushels; and Maine ranked third with 22,000,000 bushels. In the picture you are shown the kind of land in which the Minnesota potatoes are grown. This is in the great valley of the Red River of the North, opposite Fargo, N. Dak. Like all other farming, potato raising has been made easier by improved machinery. When potatoes were grown only in truck patches, they were tended chiefly by hand. They were hoed by hand, and dug by hand. This was slow, back-breaking work. Now great diggers, pulled by horses, lift the tubers out of the ground, and shake the earth from them. The diggers shown here are drawn by four horses. Pickers follow and placed the potatoes in open-work baskets. The potatoes are gathered up in wagons, and made ready for the local markets or for shipment. Observe the great stretch of level country. What have the pickers on their backs? Name the chief potato-growing states. Keystone ID: 16725 Note: All titles, descriptions, and location coordinates are from the original Keystone Slide documentation as supplied by the Keystone View Company. No text has been edited or changed.