Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1872-11-06
TFrom the Financial Chronicle.J
TEE CONDITION OF OUR WOOL
GROWERS,

The census of 1870 reportsIthe num-
Der of sheep in the United States to be
"a, ,O00, 900 against q 100000 in 1860 I;
and the pounds of domestic wool
brought into the market 135, ,000, 900
against 55, 600, coo in 1850 So much
care had been given to the breeding
of sheep, that the average weight of
! the f1eeces had also increased in those
ten years from 2.73 pounds to 3.5l
pounds each.
But to-day our wool growers are
not in good spirits. The price ofwool
| has been gradually sinking during
| the summer, and is now lower than it
was at this time last year. The mar
ket is sluggish. Manufactures are
waiting for lower prices and the pro-
ducers are hoping for an improve
ment; while our storehouses are full
of domestic and foreign wools waiting
purchasers.
a summary of the causes and con-
sequences of the present condition OF
our wool industry is: Too much wool
has been demanded; to many wooden
Foods have been made; the manu-
facturers have overstocked the mar
ket with their fabrics, and the reac-
upon the sheep husbandmen, who,
stimulated to increase their fiocks by
the unusual demands for wool during
the years of the war, had followed the
lead of the manufacturers, and are
now, with them, reaching the same
end. WOolen goods were never so
improbable to the manufacturers as
they are to-day. The production of
the Washington Mills of Lawrence,
Mass. lone hundred sets of cards..
was, by necessity of the market, sold
by auction on the first day of this
month at a loss estimated at not less
than twenty-five per cent. Wool is /
cheaper in New York than it is in |
London. Lots purchased by Ameri-
can buyers at the auctions of July |
and August, held there in bond, Were |
resOld at the auction in September /
and wool received from those colonial |
sales has been sent back to be reofTer-
ed.
Deep fluctuations are too often the
of the wool industry of I
our country. The wool grower is too
often elated and then discouraged by
the unsteadiness of the manufacturers
market; he has no insurance of
profit in the future. Thus in a GER
tain season, he sells his wool readily
at fifty or sixty cents a pound. The
next season it is drug at a much
less price. The higher price over
stocked the market with raw material
and with fabrics, and the value of
both declined. Now the farmer, dis
kills his sheep for their tai
low. After a while, wool becomes
scarce, goods in demand, and up goes
the price again. And so it varies
year after year, a continual see- saw
the producer and maufact-
lrer, until both conclude that there
is no money in wool. III
Uniformity and stability are what
Our wool grower rneeds-uniformity in
demand, and stability in values.
Change ruins his interests, and COM
pels him to abandon his occupation. /.
A flock of sheep is business invest
nent, which requires capital, man
agement and intelligent care. Those
farmers who are compelled to kill or
sell their fiocks on account uf an un-
stable market, or because the price of ,
wool is relatively so much lower than
he price of ouher staples that they
sannot afford to feed and tend the
'heep properly, are driven into an
,ther serious loss by the consequent
change in their farm management
md also into further loss by adapting
themselves and their estate to some !
)ther branch Of agricultural industry.
It is a bad business for them every
way.
And this must always happen
when the price of wool declines ex-
When the tide returns,
md prices again advance, and the
armer is tempted by his skill in the
business to venture once more, he en-
counters another loss in the higher
prices he must pay TO recover the
took he had disposed of; and, again
n the time he must use to Gull out,
md get into a productive condition, y