St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1890-03-29
Don't Underrate Small Industries.

IcDohGoujy LILO lupoTIduCo VI Sudll LII
dustries, or rather of the manufacture OF
little things, has been referred to in our
columns because we have feared that
Southern investors and business men
| would overlook them, and give their ex-
elusive attention to enterprises that re
quire large capital, and were attended
with much greater risk. Recently our es-
teemed contemporary, the Charleston
Nesos and Courier published local con-
corning the railroad projects of that city,
which contained the views held by q
prominent railroad man. He is re-
ported to have said: sit makes me mad
when l hear people talking about starting
up such enterprises as tooth pick factories
in Charleston. This city should only be
satisfied when it has started number of
enterprises of great dimensions. Such
an opinion would naturally be held by a
man connected with railroads, because his
daily business has brought him into con-
tao. with others engaged in like enter
prises, and he is constantly called upon to
consider affairs of magnitude, in compare
son with which all lesser things seem tri-
vial and contemplate. But the gentle
man quoted and others who entertain SIM
liar indeas, are greatly mistaken. Enter
prises of great dimensions" require heavy
capital at the outset, and continually keep
a large amount of money locked up in
their plant, besides that other considerable
amount employed as working capital
When business is good, profits fair, labor
satisfied, all goes smoothly A.; but when
troubles come from any cause, and bust
ness stagnates, then the plant no longer
earns the interest on its cost, wages are
reduced, often operations cease, and the
work people scatter. The stoppage of a
factory in which thousand wage earners
are employed, is serious loss to the place
in which it is located. Every citizen is in
some way injured by it. If tbs same cap
ital were distributed among twenty enter
prises, of various kinds, with fifty men
employed at each, the stoppage of one
would scarcely be felt, and the workers
thrown out of employment would soon find
some kind of remunerative occupation
without going elsewhere.
We are not opposing great enterprises
They exist all over the country and are
important constituents of it's progress and
glory. But as whole they are in a
minority as compared with the vast num-
Der of manufactures and shops that en-
ploy from three to thirty wage earners,
and the sum total of their aggregated cap
ital is less than that of the smaller con-
Germs. enterprises of great dimensions"
are quicker to feel the effects OF financial
troubles than are those of small size, and
when they fail, the injury to the surround
ing community and to the country at large
is commensurate with the magnitude of
their former operations. The making of
toothpicks, shoe pegs, pins, and multi
tude of little things in daily use is not be-
lifting, nor is the industry, whatever it
may be, of small count.
It is slL very well for our prominent
railroad man" to advocate the building of
lar shops in Charleston. We have no
doubt that such an enterprise conducted
on sound business principles, would pay
there as Handsomely as elsewhere, but
neither he nor any other man has right
to ridicule those petty industries that
furnish steady work and good wages to
thousands of industrious people. On the
contrary, while advocating the establish
ment of extensive enterprises, he should
encourage instead of getting mad at those
who propose to make tooth picks, shoe
laces or any other useful articles
Little drops of water, little grains of sand,
Make the mighty ocean and the beauteous
land"-
and there would be quite as much sense in
getting mad at single drop because it
was not sea, or at grain of silica be-
cause it was not mountain, as to get mad
at those who desire to engage in any
honest industry, however small it may be
in comparison with enterprises of great
The story of the mouse that gnawed the
- &bo 1soyo
has it's counterpart in the history of many
enterprises OF great dimensions" in our
which have been saved from ruin
BY the money accumulated in banks from
he petty savings of hundreds of wage
sarners, and loaned upon the security of |
he great plant whose owners we're i'm
neshed in financial net from which they |
could not otherwise have escaped. Don't
1nderrate the importance of small indus
ies.-Manufacturers Record