The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1897-01-10
TALKS ON CEREALS
G. WOOD DAVIS SUBMITS TO AN
INTERVIEW.
lfter . Long silence. he Comedies the
Eagles Fairness and Gives His Views on
the Bread Supply Of the World, Com
paring the Yields of Recent Years and
Summing up Possibilities. He Reaches
the Conclusion That Most Cereal Values
Will Very Appreciabiy Advance Before
the First of July.

the Conclusion That Most Cereal Values
Will Very Appreciabiy Advance Before
the First of July.
c. Wood Davis, the noted writer on
cereals. was in Wichita last night. a
reporter for the Eagle found mis- name
on the register at the Carey and sending
up his card was soon ushered up to NJ.
Davis room. He found Mr.. Davis hard
at work on some typewriter manu-
script, and although very busy ne con-
sented to talk with the reporter. Mr..
Davis has not the best of feelings to-
ward newspapers as a whole, as he
says that they have constantly misrep
resented him. A case in point, he said
last night, was that Of his alleged pre-
ciction of the prospects for two dollar
wheat. He has never made such a pre-
dicticn &c any one, he says. Once he
1rophesied that wheat would ultimate
reach dollar and half, but this was
The highest price he had ever predict
ed FOR it. Mr.. Davis at first flatly re-
fused to say a word for publication.
The reporter assured him that the peo-
pie OF southern Kansas and Oklahoma
were very anxious to have his opinion
on his fayorite subject. He said that he
had repeatedly, during the last few
years, refused to be interviewed by re-
porters, but had faith In the Eagles
reputation for fairness and would break
his silence in favor of the Eagle read
ers.
In answer to a question as TO the gen.
era; bread supply of the world, Mr..
Davis SAID:
IN the last thirteen years, or since
Of he ovid hoe
increased less than four million acres,
While the rye area Of the world has de-
creased four million acres, and in the
same time the world areas under buck
wheat, maslin and spelt have diminish
ed by five million acres. Buckwheat,
maslin and spelt being used as exclu-
sively for bread as wheat and rye, it
follows that worlds bread-bearing lands
are actually five million acres less than
in 1884, al;hcugh the bread-eaters-that
is, the popula ton of European lineage
have in the meantime increased more
than Il per cent. In other words, the
power 20 produce bread has shrunken
about per cent, while the requirements
for bread have increased Is per cent
1T follows that requirements, as re-
lated 70 acres, are now a fifth greater
than in 1884. This statement appears
paradoXical to those who have seen, all
the bread-making grains selling for
lower prices in recent years than had
been known in more than a hundred
years, but the statement loses all sem
blance to the improbable when another
and related fact is taken into considera-
ton: and that is, that no less than ten
of the fourteen world crops harvested
from 1882 TO 1895, inclusive, gave world
yields an acre so far above the average
world yields Of the last twenty-five fnar-
vests that the aggregate over-average
yield was no less than !, 259 900, 900 bush
els, while the four under-average mar
vests were so little below the average
that the aggregate under-average pro-
duct was but 25S, 000, 900 bushels. That
is, the last fourteen world wheat crops
preceding that of 1896 gave a product
eggregating 1,o01 900. 900 bushels in ex-
cess Of average yields from the whole
number of acres harvested in fourteen
years.
notwithstanding the great deficit
from the worlds rye harvest Of 1891
the year of the Russian famine no less
than eleven out of fourteen world rye
harvests Rave given yields above the
average. OF the six wheat crops Of the
world preceding that of 1896, every one
was largely above the average in acre
yield, even including that of 1891. which
was nearly 1T cutie 100,0o0,000 bushels
greater than that of 1896, and quite as
large as tina. of 1897 now promises to
BE-
so enormous has been the production
of all the primary food staples-grains
and potatces--in the last four years.
that the world has grown and consumed
40 600. 900 busheic more of wheat: S0o.-
900 900 tushels more Of rye: 3000o0,000
bushels more of barley, $50, 900 900 BUSH
els more OF oats. and quite $500 900. 900
bushels more of potatoes in the four
years ending with 1895 than it did in the
tour years ending with 1891. although
in the earlier four years each and all
these products gave yields which, in
their aggregate, exceeded average har-
vests from the acres employed.
$50 great naS peen the increase or
population and so meagre the additions
to the worlds cultivated acreage since
lsSi-about which time the United States
ceased TO add largely TO the worlds
food-bearing acres-that, as related TO
population, the worlds wheat and rye |
bearing lands ere now deficient by more |
.,,an 49, 00. 900 acres, and should the next
harvest-world harvest-of wheat and !
rye be no better than that of 1895 the I
product would be less than world re-
QuiremeDts by quite 50O,0O0,uOO buSheIS !
of the two grains.
ITO state the fact in other terms. we !
NAV say that ar average crop of wheat
and rye would be less than world re- |
uuirements in the measure of more than |
500. 900 900 bushels. 1t is because the |
crop of 1896, oc both wheat and rye, was
somewhat below the average in acre
Yield that prices, in the producing dis |
tricts of the United States. are now |
more than double those current in the |
summer of 1894, and you can judge what !
the prices are likely TO be should the /
world harvest OF 1897 prove to be no |
be ter than tha. Of 1896.
1.-The situatio is just this-of course, |
my remarks refer to the whole bread |
growing and bread-eating world-pop !
ulation is increasing faster than ever; |
acres under the bread-making grains in /
stead OF increasing show a small de- |
crease: the existing acreage is now 1
that is, with crops no better than aver
age ones-deficient fully a sixth: there 1