The Bozeman weekly chronicle. (Bozeman, Mont.) 1883-1889, 1883-11-07
Miscellaneous.

The effect on.trade in Portland and
other cities of Oregon and Washington
of the completion of the Northern Pacific
is highly interesting, as well as impor-
tant. The new cha mel of traffic had not
been open thirty days before the Pacific
coast merchants noted marked changes
creeping into their established methods
of doing business. There had for twenty
years been slowly forming them safe, but
provincial customs in trade. In the
isolated situation of Oregon and Wash
ington, with a limited and more or less
crude population, the tendency was for
individual capitalists to engage in seeeral
lines of business The banker was quite
likely to be the miller. the lumberman,
the coal miner, and general storekeeper
of his village or city. 1t may have been
because there were too few of his class
to represent each OF these several pur-
suits or it may have been that other
classes were distracted from them by
more congenial and lucrative employ
ment. With the peculiar advantages Of
the trader class ina ,;cw.. country for
making large and quick profits, the Pa
cific coast merchants had gradually set
tied into assured commercial habits. The
advent of the railroad has brought with
it the alert, grasping, tireiess methods of
eastern merchants, with whom competi
ton is the lite Of trade. Already the
cori,-fed bacon, lard and pork of Iowa
is,dri,ing the wheat-fed articles of Ore
gon and Washington out Of their local
markets. Chicago beefspacking houses
and Baltimore oyster firms are represent
ed by keen. active agents. who have it
IN their power to shape the market in
dependently of the established local
dealers. Yet there seems to be harmony
between the old merchants and the new
blosd, and reciprocity and protection
prevail. Indeed, the status at present of
these outsiders is that OF a factor and
not of jobber or dealer. Goods are
shipped to them. in trial lots Of a few
cars, and sold wholly by sample to the
local jobbers. in time this primitive and
cautious way of doing business will give
place to branch houses established by
ample capital, and supplied with full
stocks of goods, to meet every demand in
their line Of trade. The complexion of
trade in such Il city as Portland will
change beyond recognition III five years.
Men who are now interested in dozen
different lines of trade will find it neces-
sary to concentrate their brains and
energy to some one business. New men
Will come in to take their places in other
pursuits Retailers now will become
jobbers, and through all conceivable
the process of the division
of trade will 60 on. All this IS the best
that could happen to any city. 1t is the
change which produces great commercial
centers, reduces commerce to its most
healthy conditions and promotes the
general welfare of a large population as
hardly any other o1re thing can. As the
warp and woof of trade are spun by the
Of eastern for Pacific coast
products, we shall lind the export of the
latter increasing in equal and probably
greater proportion than the importation
hT eastern goods. The wheat, lumber,
cattle, fish and other staples OF Oregon
and Washington have but just begun to
find their way to market.