The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1897-12-19
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need another Klondike. The present
one has been the means of giving ire
mendous impetus to shipping industries.
Alaska is a country of wonderful min
eral possibilities, for beside its gold
fields it contains untold quantities of
copper and iron, nickel and cinnabar.
There are hundreds of vessels engaged
in trade with Alaska, and the coming
year will see a great increase and de-
velopment of that trade.
From Portland, the metropolis of the
Pacific northwest, to San Diego, we
have some of the busiest ports known
to commerce. The registered tonnage
in and out of the Columbia River in
1894 was $50 vessels and $4,000 tons, its
commerce no less than $1,000, 900, exclu-
sive of products and merchandise
shipped by rail. All the ocean steam
ers call at Astoria, which is a city of
enterprises embracing large tanneries,
lumber and saw mills, salmon can
neries, tin can factories and other in
dustries. A system of jetty work at
Humboldt Bay has made it a safe and
accessible port, increasing the depth of
water on the bar and maintaining per-
manency in the course of the channel
Eureka originally a dense forest of
ly water front, its commercial interests
centering around it's wharves. No ship
ping industry has been so carefully de-
Veloped, unless it be that of lumber
manufacturing, there being nearly
forty lumber and shingle mills in the
vicinity, principally controlled by resi-
dents of Eureka. Unrigged barges,
steam and sailing vessels are constant
ly arriving or departing. No other city
in America owns so large a proportion
of the vessels trading at the port on
which the city is located. Large guam
titles of freight are discharged from
Port Hartford. Santa Barbara, though
mainly a picturesque resort, does an
excellent shipping business in lumber,
fruits, nuts, etc. Port Los Angeles has
the longest and most expensive wharf
in the world, where vessels including
Golfers, are always TO be seen lying or
discharging. San Diego, renowned as
a health resort, has one of the prettiest
harbOrs on the coast From San Simeon
and Cayucos are shipped butter, cheese
and other dairy products. Lompoc
Landing exports products of the soil;
GOleta, cereals, aSphaltum, fruits and
nuts; Carpinteria is the shipping point
for an exceedingly rich valley; Ven
tura that for Santa Clara Valley on the
north, where are raised immense guam
titles of wheat, barley and beans, and
where livestock, crude petroleum and
asphaltum are exported. Hueneme, the
shipping point for this valley on the
south of the river, ships more farm
products than any other grain section
south of San Luis. Newport, $50 miles
from San Francisco, has an immense
traffic in oranges, lumber and other
Southern California products. Los An
geles, twenty miles from the seaboard,
has five shipping points on the sea-
cOast-POrt Los Angeles, San Pedro,
RedOndo, East San Pedro and Newport
The sinking of oil wells there will make
a market for this fuel outside of the
city and thus increase coast business.
No railroad company, no steamship
line has exclusive right of way on the
ocean. The ocean is the best possible
regulator of commerce-better than all
the railroad commissions in the coun-
try. A wise policy on the part of our
Government has decreed in laws on our
statute books that no vessel of any de-
scription can engage in coast trade I'M
less it is of American make controlled
by American interests.
Every step taken to advance our
commercial, manufacturing, viticultur-
al, horticultural, agricultural, mining
and other industries benefits coast
trade. According to authoritative state
ment, California has SO, 600 900 acres Of
arabic land adapted to the production
of beet sugar. With this acreage we
should raise beets enough to supply
the entire United States with sugar.
There is no reason why the future Of
our State should not reach the highest
expectations conceived for it. It's CHI
mate is uneXcelled. A. Mecca for con-
sumptives and invalids generally, it's
death rate is nevertheless lower than
that of any other State in the Union.
It's citrus fruits compare with any.
Spain has not equaled its olive oil. It's
wines, woods, farm products, grain,
cattle, sheep and horses compel the adj
miration of the world. The most vivid
imagination cannot portray what is
possible for California within the next
half century. 1t is indeed Gods own
country.
GEORGE c. PERKINS.