The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1892-02-18
WHAT TEXAS WANTS.
VELAsCO, TEXAS, DEEP WATER PORT
SOLVES THE QUESTION.
An Interesting Letter or Cattle Shipping
and Packeries in Texas-Facts that Can
Not be Disputed and Should be Care
fully Read by Cowmen.
To the Editor of The Statesman:

| To the Editor of The Statesman
Notwithstanding Texas leads all
the other states in the union in the
number of her cattle. she suffers the
most in the matter of prices. The
greatest cause OF this is the distance
from her ranges and feeding pens to
the markets. This has always been
the case, and so long as cattle are
marketed at the present places it will
continue. Texas fat beeves in Kansas
City stock yards suffer by comparison
with Kansas and Missouri beeves.
Ours have travelled tedious, flesh
wearing journeys Of four to six hun
bred miles, consuming days. Theirs
are fresh from the fields and corn bins.
At Chicago the difference is more to
our advantage. This is true Of cattle
intended for use in either of these
places; but more particularly is it true
of cattle which buyers want to ship
further East, for our beeves present all
uninviting prospect for that use
This evil can be remedied effectual-
ly and forever by Strengthening at
home. True, many experiments in
this business have been failures, but
failures are the stepping-stones to
success. Already we have one sue
cessful packery of admirable capacity
at Fort Worth, showing large profits
The cattle of Texas, numbering
7,876,271 head, and valued at $74, $780,
600, show an industry OF such dimen-
sideration of every economic question
relating to it. Last year there were
shipped out of this state 100000 head
of cattle. 1t is fair to presume that
this great army of beeves, which
would have covered whole counties in
it's march north, would have brought
to the producer fully SO 1-3 per cont
more money had they been sold to a
Big -Four composed of Texas cow men,
and business men. Every
disadvantage which you labor
under in business reduces your
column of profits The man who
hauls his wheat to market forty
miles, cannot make as much as
the man who hauls it twenty miles.
The stockraiser who transports beef
six hundred miles to market, cannot |
possibly get as much for his product
as the man who sends it only two
hundred miles.
1t is well known that in Slaughter
ng cattle every particle of the beef
must be used, from the tip of horn to
he end of the longest hair in it's tail,
md if for any reason any part of it
cannot he used, the profits are cut
Town.
The cheaper the transportation
rom the producer or factory to the
market or consumer, the greater the
price the producer or factory will get
or the product. From and to seaport
points are the cheapest transportation
'ates. 1t is possible to ship with
profit, articles from gulf water points
% New York, whose whole mar
Ietable price would not pay the
from Fort Worth or
Dallas to said gulf points. But gulf
n any other sea ports are useless as
ocations for packeries unless the
water is deep enough to permit ocean
without Tightening
Refrigerated meat cannot belightered.
1t is absolutely impossible to take
neat in lighter boats out to sea five
II ten miles to a ship, and preserve
he proper temperature until it is
oaded. Refrigerators must be To-
lated at deep water, where the ship
while loading, is rubbing the paint off
If the side of the packery.
Two years ago a committee of cow
nen visited the mouth Of the BraZos
md said to the syndicate Of men who
we're trying to get deep water, "If
you will guarantee us deep water, we
will recommend that the packery To-
cation for which we are searching
shall be here" These gentlemen were
Charles Goodnight, Gen. II. B. Stod-
lard, Ike Pryor, r. f. Maddox and
4. M. Ehrenworth. What they
wanted guaranteed, at other points is
yet an uncertainty. Now it is q fact
1t BrazOs' mouth.
A city is rising around the only
leep water port on 1900 miles of Gulf
coast, from New Orleans to Tampico.
Vessels in Velasco harbor can load
o the gunwales with Texas beef and
very product of beef, and steam in
en- minutes from the packery caves
,ut into blue water without hinder
nee from any natural or unnatural
ause, be it bar, sand, wave or wharf
octopus.
Steamship transportation of freights
S twice as fast and five times as cheap
IS by railroad. The experience of bust
less people at this place is that
reight by water from New York is
more rapid than express by land, and
hat by water freights can be landed
lere from Liverpool in shorter
ime than from New York by rail.
Dressed beef from NelascO can
De lanued at Norfolk and Baltimore
i've and one-half days and in New
York in seven days. 1t can be placed |
n Liverpool in the same time it can
De from Kansas City by railroad and
water without rehandling. Horn,
fertilizers and canned goods can be
reighted to Liverpool cheaper than
rom Fort Worth to Kansas City.
Governor Hogg in his speech to the
convention said: "You
IAN now ship your cattle unreasonable
'ates, and with a decrease per mile as
you near the coast" One could go on
oiling up advantages for the location
Of packeries at Nelasco, but they are
patent to any one. With few words
about the immensity of the business