St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1885-11-13
Minneapolis Millers Unable to Operate
Their Mills and Pay Such High
Railway Rates.
They Request the Different Lines to Re-
duce Their Tariffs, but Meet
With no Success.
Manitoba Road Revises IT'S Wood
Tariff on Request of Railway
Commissioners.
Stockholders of the Dakota g. Great
Southern Sell Out to st. Paul
Capitalists.
wheat and Flour Rates.

apOllS mlllerS was nelQ Ill Une w eSC HOGcl
at Minneapolis on Wednesday. The meet
ing was called to discuss wheat and flour
rates on east bound shipments from Mime
apolis to Chicago and New York. On Nov.
l, the Northwestern Traffic association
lines and the Minnesota q Northwestern
advanced their rates from st. Paul and
Minneapolis to Chicago from Is to
III cents per 100 pounds. This,
the millers thought, was too high,
and accordingly asked the rail-
roads to reconsider and reduce the flour
and wheat rates to Is cents as before
Nov. 1. and to join them at the West hotel
at Minneapolis and discuss the matter. At
the meeting the millers stated their position,
showing that if the rates were not reduced
all the mills i'll Minneapolis would be closed
before Dec. 1. They stated that they were
paying high prices for wheat, and
if rates remained at 171s cents,
and the Eastern trunk lines made an adj
vance from the twenty-cent rate from
Chicago to New York. they could not pos
sibly continue business, as they would op-
crate their mills at an actual loss.
The millers stated that if the traffic lines
would reduce their rate they thought they
could keep the Eastern trunk lines from adj
vancing theirs. On Wednesday evening,
however, word was received from Chicago
stating that the trunk lines had decided to
advance from 20 to 25 cents on Nov. %. j.
II. Hiland, general agent for the Millers'
association, wrote to the eastern trunk lines
a few days ago, asking that they hold to the
twentycent rate for few days. until he had
talked the matter over with the officials of
the local lines, but his letter had no effect
AT the meeting the representatives of the
railways present explained that it was the
custom to advance the rate after the close of
navigation, and they were doing the same
as they had done other seasons. The fifteen
cent rate, they stated, was all right for the
summer, but in the winter the lines were
much
HARDER TO OPERATE,
and the seventeen-and-a-half- rate was
only three quarters of a cent per ton per
mile, and they thought this was little
enough. They stated plainly that the adj
vance was the work of the railroad commits
sioners' forcing them to reduce the rate on
local shipments in the state. The commits
sioners, they stated, had knocked all the
profit from local shipments and they wanted
to make something out of the through haul,
over which rate the commissioners had
no jurisdiction. Considerable time was
taken up in discussing the action of the
commissioners. One gentleman who under
stood matters pretty thoroughly stated that
the commissioners had taken the rates on
the Breckenridge division of the Manitoba
road as a basis. Rates on this division were
shown to be less than anywhere in the
state of Iowa. the roads in which state haul
at minimum. Why the rates on this
division of the Manitoba road were so low
was stated to be from the Manitoba quoting
a fiat rate to Minneapolis from points along
the line to make them as low as the transit
rates of the Milwaukee road from points
On its Hastings Dakota division to
Chicago. which division is competitor to
the Breckenridge division of the Manitoba
road. If the commissioners compelled all
the lines to make rates as low as those on
the Breckenridge division of the Manitoba
road, they could not operate it. Grain was
the only product they had to carry. After
this discussion was over, the millers stated
that at meeting among themselves some
time ago, it was decided to close up every
mill in Minneapolis by Dec. if the adj
vanced rates continued in effect, on both
the Northwestern and Eastern trunk lines,
and store the wheat until navigation opened
next season.
The milers are very much agtated over
the affair, and so are the railroads, as the
shutting down of the mills will greatly de-
crease the revenue of the railroads. In
the winter months the mills are supposed to
furnish about half the east-bound traffic of
the Northwestern traffic lines, and whether
or not the railroads will consent to reduce
their rates is not yet known, but it is
thought that they will refuse. as they wish
to fight the grain commissioners in this
way. At the mills the output does not
vary much from day to day, but ranges be-
tween rs. 900 and $4,000 barrels for each
twenty-four hours. Business in flour con-
tinues very steady but dull. The range of
actual selling prices is quite wide, as occa-
sional concessions have been made to effect
large sales.