The daily morning Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Oregon) 1883-1899, 1888-10-04
WOOD PULP. ETC.

be the next governor of New York |
state, is good example of what abil-
ity and determination and singleness
of purpose can do. Just after the
war, paper, such as THE Historian is
printed on, sold for fourteen cents
pound. He thought and planned va
rious projects for making it cheaper,
and after years of experiment and dis
couragement, hit on wood pulp" out
Of which he has made a fortune. 1t
was a matter of wide significance.
Miller's wood pulp" made cheap pa
per possible. News" paper has
steadily declined in price, and it is the
Miller process that enables THE As
ToRIAN and thousands of other papers
to sell for a mere trifle. The paper
on which these words are printed is
made chiefly from trees, cottonwood,
and pine, that grow on the Chippewa
and Sac rivers in Wisconsin. The
trees are ground into pulp, there is
some earth, little rags, and the pa
per is ready for the printer. 1t costs
THE AsToRIAN Az cents a pound,
buying it in such large lots as we do.
Thanks to the great system of rail
roads that gridiron the country and
compete for business, the paper can
be carried from the pine forests of
Wisconsin to the mouth of the Co.
lumbia river, and dumped on the o.
r. &. N. dock here for II cents a
pound, making the paper cost us six
cents a pound.
But for Miller's invention; but for
the genius of the men who threw a
track across the continent and tied a
knotin the railroad iron on top of the
backbone of the mountains, THE As
ToRIAN and other papers couldn't be
supplied for fifteen cents a week. 1t
is such men as Warner Miller that
made cheap newspapers possible.
There are good many paper mills
on this coast, but for some reason
they all seem to want to get rich too
fast, and ask very big price for their
paper; that is, the middlemen do. If
the paper manufacturers would throw
the middlemen overheard and talk
business, they could sell twice their
present output to Oregon and Wash
ington newspaper proprietors who
would be glad to encourage home in
dustry, but naturally object to build
ing up the fortunes of a commission
agent in two years.
We have a pulp mill close by at
Young's River Falls, which may in
time develop into a paper mill. The
supply of fir and spruce is inexhaust-
able, and fir and spruce make the
best pulp, better even than the Wis
consin pulp, which is the basis of the
paper ON which this is printed. Some
newspapers own their own paper
mills.
When Astoria has grown to the
size that her position and manifest
destiny entitle her, THE Historian, is
suing eight-page editions and MAN.
moth Sunday edition, will find it
more convenient to manufacture its
own paper, and will get its supply by
electric railway from its mill at
Young's River Falls, or elsewhere.
To some one who has time and can
catch onto the combination, there is
material for poem in the fact that a
lofty spruce, its roots graphing the
ancient soil, its shaggy area the haunt
of the bird and beast of the forest, its
head lifted into the glorious light;
this tall column, firm, immovable, the
result of a thousand years of sunshine
and storm, the embodiment of vigor-
Gus growth and type of the eternal
may in the subtle alchemy of mod
ern science, be cut down, trimmed,
split, sliced, seized and whirled
through wheels and pulverized, rolled,
turned into paper, flung into the NAV
of printing press, caught by teeth
and grippers, wrapped round a cylin-
der, married to the smooth embrace
of form of type, thrown on folding
table, and, what magic change! the
great tree of the forest that flashed
its dewy boughs in the rays OF
the rising sun, appears at the
next dawn, less than twenty four
hours after, as folded, printed sheet
of paper with the news of the day;
with printed on it news of events on
the other side of the world that had
not transpired when the first tremor
of the woodsman's ak yesterday went
through that trees giant frame.
People talk of magic, miracles, won
ders. Here is a bare, exact recital of
sober, daily fact.
THERE are big grain crops in Ore
gon this year, the salmon pack is
Dratty uall 7 4l~.-.l- - 1o-.,o,o