Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1875-05-15
OLYMPIA. SATURDAY MORNING, NAT IS. 1875.
THE rLY-wHEEL OF PROGRESS.

VIC Vi buc L A"S
been giving o series of articles on
Home Manufactures" which will be
read with interest. and profit by every
body. They are thoroughly practical,
and lead to the development of ideas
and schemes of substantial benefit to
the public as we'll as the profit of the
individual. We reproduced one of
these articles in our last issue, which
demonstrated that the largest per cent
age of profit realized upon all kinds OF
goods is in the labor of producing them
and putting them in the hands of the
consumer. Enough instances were cited
to reduce the proposition to an axiom,
and indicate the most serious obstacle
to the progress of oil new communities.
1t will be remembered that the writer
held that while we may furnish the
crude materials which enter into our
staple manufactures, that the greater
profit is made upon the labor which
puts them in shape and sends them
back to be bought by their original
owners. It follows as a natural conse-
quence, that the better price he realizes
in disposing of the raw material, the
more he will have to pay far all articles
in which it enters as the prevailing SUBJ
stance.
The only sound basis upon which the
people can build reasonable hope of
prosperity, isin sending every commod-
ity to market in the most finished form.
1t is not so much population we need,
as skilled and enterprising laborers,
who possess the knowledge and inclin-
alton required to begin at the lower
rounds and work their way gradually
to the plane which insures q compe-
tency as reward; and, consideration
OF far greater importance, stops leak
which drains the community of its life
blood at q time when it has none to
lose. Such men are public benefactors,
and single one is of more Importance
than hundred men who are only USE
full as the medium through which
given sum of money is necessarily dis
tributed each year for their personal
wants. The example of such an aid is
contagious. 1t causes the life-blood to
surge, andleap beyond the impediments
with which morbid inaction has clogged
the arteries.
AS the writer, in one of his subse.
quent articles, remarks: besides mere
business activity as a direct reward of
the investment, there is silent growth
of confidence in such community.
The buzz of machinery attracts stran-
gers. 1t signifies enterprise and home
resources. 1t advertises a community
even better than journals can do. The
Moline (nl.) Revieac began the year
with q record of their city n1aaufacto-
ries. Itwasa compact, well-written ar
count of their pillow factories, paper
mills, wagon shops, tub and pail facto-
ries, Marseilles quilt and cotton facto-
ries, iron foundries, etc., etc. Attract
i've wood-cuts represented the produc-
ton of their shops. The effort of the
journalist was very creditable and hon.
orable and worthy of reward. Doubt
less many read the articles, yet a larger
number merely glance OF them as cir
cular. But visit to Moline on any
week day, or q railroad ride through
the town in sight of the open shops,
the busy workmen, the various machin-
cry, the carloads of material entering
the yards, and the carloads of agricul-
tural implements and other goods GO
ing ont for distribution over the coun-
try, impress the mind more than any
description. The traveller instantly con-
cludes that such town thrives, that
money circuiates, that labor is in de-
mand, that business of various kinds
will be prosperous. Pass through any
manufacturing village on the Housa-
tonic, in Massachusetts, or on the Mer-
rimac, or on the Pawtucket, and you
will feel confidence in those commu-
mites that you cannot in a merely trad
ing city. While San Francisco did lit
tie more than receive the gold and sell
the goods and furnish hotels for the
public. there was little confidence in
the future Of the city. When her cap
italists began to invest in home manu-
features, they furnished solid ground
OF confidence that grows stronger with
every new enterprise. This confidence
extends through the interior towns of