Brenham weekly banner. [volume] (Brenham, Tex.) 1877-1907, 1879-06-13
Locsl Correspondence.
L &C TORIES.
INpTrENpENCE, TEXAS. J
Iune 9TH, 1870.


June 9TH, 1879. J
Editors Banner
Excuse u, but we are grInGcrS, and
must or should be short, practical. and 10
the point. Bat with such vast theme be
fore Us don't see how We can. When in
. attendance to the farmers convention at the
opera house. Brenham, May 18th, we wit
messed strange things. Before that cOnven-
ton We took decided. reasonable grounds
/ against the erection of cotton compress.
and in a few brief remarks favored the eS-
| tabliShmcnt of cotton spinning factory.
We were told that the idea Of 4 cotton spin
ming factory was immature, and We are Sor-
! ry 10 say that these remarks came alone
/ from grangers, and proud to know that no
middle man, no merchant. no lawyer. no
/ banker. yea, not even cotton buyer in one
word decry the cotton factory.
! We assure you and your readers that
We are in cool dead earnest in opposing the
compress, ii being wrong in principle, worse
in practice, and against the best interest of
the whole people of the great south, men,
women, and children,-both white and
| black,-landlord and tenant, mechanic.
merchant and banker, and lastly opposed
TO the grange prlncipleSs( IA copy 81 which
we send you marked).f
There was one man in that assembly
whom upon three occasions we Lave aSsiS-
ted to honor, and can say that in the posi-
ton to which he was called, that when the
issue came between monopolieS and the
people, he nobly contended for the right,
and honored the position he held more than
it honored him land if he could be induced
to step over from that compress TO the fac
tory in five years from to-day he would be
the foremost man in the Lone Star State,
for him, here is money, position and fame.
There are many reasons against the COM
press and in favor of the factory:
Ist. II is premature to erect 4 compress
until the Gull, Colorado and Santa Fe rail-
road reaches BRENNAN. If erected it should |
be so located as to be accessible to both |
reads: not place it in such predicament |
that the cotton will have to be pledged TO |
the Central railroad excluding the e., c. |
< $. F., thereby creating a monopoly in |
shipping which will be more derog-
atory t. the producers than the little gain |
they so hope to receive.
I'd. Ginning, hauling, and COMPRISING
cotton is injurious to the same, mapping,
crimping and injuring the fiber. and ii is
money thrown away-simply to get the
privilege of exporting 10 some foreign man
ufac,ory to spin, weave and fill with Chi
nese clay, starch and other things, and sent
back to where it should have been manu-
featured to be consumed.
sd. Wehave lost money enough already
by that modus operandi, as the worn out
land half starved mules, rotten fences, di-
lapidated plantations, ragged laborers, con-
blar. ,ubipiv,or
ahundantly attest. and above all the incen-
tive to labor and profits having fed, the
fields are disorganized, obstruction and de
moralization reigns supreme.
4th. Since 1920 this country has raised
100, ooo, 900 bales of cotton, (most of which
she has shipped to foreign parts for manu-
facturing). To gin, bale ard compress this
has no: cost less than five dollars bale,
making S5oo.ooo,ooo thrown away, and
lost to the sunny south; what has she, to-
day, to show for the millions upon millions
of heart aches among hard laborers-a
PROSTATE, bankrupt and dispirited people
crying ''hard times" all of which we
should partly attribute to ourselves, not ac-
cuse the Yankees for it all; for they unlike
us did not think to erect manufactures,
like Old and New England, Georgia and
New Braunsfels, Texas, was premature.
5th. Having robbed our sunny southern
soil of its virgin productiyeness and can
not get few thousand dollars to erect a
cotton spinning factory (which might spin
the feecy staple into cotton yarns, thereby
doubling the price to us by our cotton fur
niShing at the same time employment to
hundre ds of homeless women and children).
Tell me "Mr. Premature" when you think
the poverty stricken people af Dixie's land
will be able to invest in manufacturing, ex-
pecially when the compress costs only $780,
900, and No. spinning factory, that
would yield annual income of $4,000,
would only cost $4,000. This we will
demonstrate by mathematics: For SA,-
All machinery can be set up near Bren-
ham, which will bring the following results:
Daily expenses SIS5.4a gross daily earn
ings SS4S. Net daily earnings SI62.6o.
This run to its full capacity 5oodays makes
S4S, 100, or if it can only run one half time
S2+ $50. This calculation is made for the
spinning of 1000 bales Of cotton Let
BRENNAN start this spinning factory and
small ones would spring up in the country
until Washington, Burleson and Austin
counties would bud and blossom as the
rose. Property in two years would adj
vance beyond all comprehension in Bren-
ham, and farmers would cease to growl and
grumble at the middle man, capital would
''then come" here to find profitable invest
ment. Even the Coils Englishman might
raise another onion crop, Tor this would
create home market, and stop the impor-
tation of onions, potatoes etc. by the hum
dreds and thousands of dollars worth. Lest
we should weary you and encroach upon
space we will close with the following: A
first class fire proof cotton yard, and 40
horse power engine to compress forty thou
sand bales of cotton would cost $50, 900,
the expenses would necessarily be $1,000,
only leaving $Io,oco to be distributed
among the stock holders; while a new pro-
cess cotton spinning factory would cost
S4,4I7, daily expenses SIS5.4o, gross
daily earnings S34S. Net daily product
SI62.6c. But we are told in the face of rea-
son, light and mathematics (demonstrated)
that this is immature. When will it ever
mature? Echo answers when? A people
Quilted of $4,000 to build compress will
cry when? We answer when the southern
cotton planter awakes from his Rip Van
Wrinkle sleep, and grangers have their dis
eased, near sighted eyes opened to true
principles of the order which he claims to
be laboring for, and to the interest of power
ty stricken humanity.
VI n