The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1875-01-28
MANUFACTURING INTERESTS.
How They Appeared to an Editor---The
Prospects Ahead.

Ieel U10 Tel1eI OI BetulllS uOWn 10 naru-
pan, says the Springfield Republican.
There is great difficulty in securing a
continuation of the agreements to cur
tail production. Those industries, par
ticularly, which have reduced wages be-
gin to feel themselves in accord with the
reduced scale of profits and production.
The paper manufacture is no longer car
ried on at dead loss, at least, and the
cotton mills are generally resuming full
time, with reductions i'll wages. The
market for cotton goods has been re-
lieved of the surplus and, in general, the
textile markets are not overstocked with
manufactures. During the year, raw
cotton has fallen IL J percent. inprice, and
the manufactured article quite as much;
brown sheeting, forinstance, 121 per cent. =,
prints five or six per cent, and denims
121. Both the manufacturing and the
trading interest have weathered the
double embarrassment of dull year and
great cotton crop successfully. Never
theless, it is not to our credit that
foreign nations should still be able to
supply us with $23, 239, 900 worth of
cotton goods, as they have the past year,
through the port of New York alone.
This is reduction of So, 400, 900 from
the importation of the same class of
goods two years ago. Again, our e4-
portation of cotton goods is nothing to
what it may become under fair financial
conditions. All told, it amounts to only
SO, 600, 900, and very small share of this
goes to the rest of America. We buy
$50, 900, COO worth of sugar and tropical
products from Cuba, for instance, and
sell her only 1868, 900 worth of cottons.
Now, it is evident that every breech-
clout and shirt in the American tropics
ought to come off from our looms.
Improvement in manufacture is most
discernible in woolens, although the
wooden manufacturers claim to be more
depressed than the cotton. American
dress goods and cloths are gradually
superseding the foreign. American
silks, too, are received with increasing
favor. The importation of silks at New
York for the past two years has fallen off
one-fouuth in value, and not, we suspect,
in amount, as the reduction in the price
of silks must have sustained the total
consumption, if not increased it: 1t is
singular injustice, by the way, that this
most serviceable of all fabrics should be
habitually denominated as "gew-gaws. y
One Of the most striking features of
American manufactures at this moment
is the rapidity Of their western develop
ment. The prosperity of the West dur
ing the past year has greatly aided that
development. The Chicago Tribune
claims that nearly the entire bulk of the
ready-made clothing sold in that city,
amounting for the past year to $12, 900,
600 wholesale, is made up in that city
and employs from 5000 to 5000 hands.
The Chicago makers conform the char
ncter of the clothing to the climate of
the consumer, whether it be Michigan OF
Texas, while eastern makers attempt to
strike an average, they say. The first
western felt-hat factory has just been
opened at Chicago. Nearly all the mems
heavy wear of boots and shoes sold in
Chicago are now manufactured there.
This business has grown fully one-third
in the past year, and competition with
the East has been greatly aided by re.
duction of Is per cent in wages. The
reputation of st. Joseph-made boots is
not second on the plains to those from
any quarter. The boot and shoe manu-
facture is likely to tend westward, where
the hides are and where the leather vii
ultimately be tanned. A great cluster OF
iron industries has gathered at Chicago,
which have produced, this past year
$29, 727,000 worth of goods, against
$32, 100, 600 in 1873, the reduction being
in the price rather than in the quantity
of the goods manufactured. Farm i'm
plements and wagons show great in
crease, but carriages, which are of the
nature of luxuries, falling off 15,00t
reapers have been made, an increase O.
one-third, which is attributed to the
English demand for American machines
to take the place of the striking agri
cultural laborers. This is a curious con
troversy of private interests, that the
English farmland, striking for highel
wages and threatening to immigrate tC
America, should be beaten out of his
position by American reapers and othel
products of Yankee ingenuity. We shal
finally corner poor Hodge, and make hin
immigrate to us or starye. This theory
has some confirmation in the returns O
the bureau of statistics, which show tina
of the $3,310,O00 worth of agriculture
implements sent abroad, last year
$371 900 went to England; 81, 1853, 00t
also went to Germany, doubtless dis
placing some of the countless German
immigrants to this country.
The wide geographical distribution o
the few manufactured goods which W,
export indicates that the whole world i
open to us, when we have reformed ou
currency and moderated and simplifieC
our tariff, so that it will not defeat it
own object. To give few additional in
stances: 1'083 railroad cars went abroad
last year, averaging about 81 800 each il
value, some of them going to Englant
and Germany, many of them to tn
Dominion, and 296 to Chill; of the ST,
100000 of iron and steel goods, Eng
land took 81, $50, 900, two-thirds of whicl
was steel, while Germany took abou
the same amount, two-thirds iron, an,
nearly every country in the world too
some; 81, 100000 worth OF sewing ma
chimes is not included in the above, hal
of which went to England and Germany
We believe that without any Legislation
to foster special interests, but simply b.
our return to a sound currency, health
industrial conditions and honest admin
istration, we shall be able to extend tn
sphere of our international trade vastly
On the other hand, England is now i
the depths of coal and iron depression
quite as great as that in America. Me
are left out of employment by the hur
dred, though in some cases, by returnin
to ten hours a day and submitting t
great reductions in wages, works al
kept open. At Sheffield this state {
affairs is attributed to continental con
petition and the introduction of ms
chinery, as well as to the failure of til