The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-02-14

From the Chicago Times Herald.
Joseph Letter, who has secured con-
troll of the wheat market, has in his
possession the food supply of many
millions Of people. Maybe Mr.. Letter
doesn't know it, but if he should
choose to divert his 100000 bushels
of wheat to foreign channels, bread
would double, possibly quadruple, in
price in Chicago, and the temptation
to make short-weight loaves would be
offered every baker. Every man who
owned a bushel Of wheat would be
tempted to buy corn to grind and mix
with his wheat flour, and the changes
are the consumer would be so anxious
to procure bread that he would wink
at the adulteration even If he knew Of
1t.
Fifteen millions of bushels of wheat!
The mere words do not convey the
immensity or Importance of Mr.. Lett
er's speculative venture. Never before
has one man, or any combination of
spectators, held such an enormous
amount of the bread grain in control
Seventy millions of people are directly
and vitality interested in this gigantic
venture. 1T would be difficult to say
what this young Napoleon of the
chases If he hadn't nation Of hungry
mouths back Of him. He and his de-
scendants for twenty generations
couldn't consume it. There are not
mills enough in Chicago to grind the
grain into flour in ten years, nor bak-
ers who could mix, mold and bake it
Into crisp loaVeS in another ten years.
Fifteen millions of bushels Of wheat!
A bulk nearly three times that of the
Masonic Temple-the highest and larg-
est building Of it's class in the world.
In that gigantic pile, towering twen-
ty-four stories and covering one
fourth of a block of the most valuable
real estate in Chicago, there are $780,
249 cubic feet of space-so say the
architects. But Mr.. Letters little pile
of wheat would dwarf that structure If
placed beside it, reaching almost three
times higher, with the same ground
dimensions, occupying 1S,6000 900 cubic
feet
The highest authority says there are
1000 grains of wheat to the pound.
Therefore, as Mr.. Letter owns Is, 000, 900
bushels, each weighing sixty pounds
the total weight of his possessions
would require a counter balance of
9O0,OOO,OOO pounds-a total that would
keep family of five persons counting
steadily for two years at the rate Of
200 per minute. without intermisslon to
check off the weight and the total
number of grains of wheat in this
huge purchase is only g. 900, Goo, 000, 0OO
This sum is sufficiently large to perplex
even astronomers, who measure dis
tances of stars by the millions of miles
but trillions-never! The star gazer
guesses after he passes the ninth row
of ciphers in his computations.
Let us suppose that Mr. Letter want
ed to move his wheat to some other
point, and determine approximately
how many cars he would need if he
shipped 1t all by rail. He holds 900-
100000 pounds, or 100000 tons. The
average capacity of freight cars is 40
600 pounds, or twenty tons. Therefore,
22,500 cars would be needed to trans
port this bulk of grain. The average
length Of such cars including the
space between for the coupling appar-
atus, is thirty-six feet. This train load
of grain would be $4,000 feet, or 1891
miles long. That is to say, if Mr. Lett
er chooses to ship all his grain in one
train, he will have a string of cars
reaching almost from Chicago to the
Mississippi river at Quincy, Ill.
If 1t Were Baked in Bread.
But if Mr.. Letter doesn't want to ship his
property, but chooses to grind 1t up and put
1t on the market he can sit down with pencil
and paper and figure that as four and one
half bushels of wheat will make a 200-pound
barrel of -four, he can place $685. 1888 1888 loayes
of bread within the reach of the hungry At 5
cents per loaf Mr.. Letter could obtain SIG. $685.
$685. for his property. AS his brokers have
claimed that he purchased his wheat at an
average OF 70 cents per busheI, his profits as a
baker would be hundred thousand or SO over
$4,000, 900.
Just suppose that Mr.. Letter were philan-
tnropic and that he would be willing to feed
the hungry with his hoard Vital statistics