The Colfax gazette. [volume] (Colfax, Wash.) 1893-1932, 1900-11-30
MAKE OUR own SUGAR
Best Beet Land in the World Is
In the PaI0use Country,
Worlds Average Is IA Per Gent
sugar Value-Palouse Average
Is Over 1S Per Cent.

worlds Average Is IA Per Gent
Sugar VaIue-Palouse Average
Is Over 1S Per Cent.
At the town of Waverly; just over the
whitman county line in Spokane county,
at the end OF spur of the O. r. & n.
Company line, is located the beet sugar
factory OF the Washington State Sugar
Company, and which is said to be one of
the largest and best equipped plants for
the manufacture OF beet sugar in
America
The Washington State Sugar Com
pany plant is owned principally by d. C.
Corbin of Spokane, builder of the Spo-
kane Falls & Northern Railroad. and
several times a millionaire The build
lngs we're erected and plant installed in
the summer OF 1899, and that fall the
factory had a campaign" as the sugar
making season is called, of about twenty
days. Sixty tons Of sugar was manu-
featured, but through difficulty in
obtaining skilled labor, the product OF
the factory was unmarketabe
Mr.. Corbin did not despair, however.
While last year but $500 tons OF beets
were obtainable, this year the quantity
OF beets has been in excess of 5000 tons,
and the total output of the factory for
campaign OF less than thirty days will
be between ,O00,0 900 and 1,200, 900
pounds OF graduated sugar, that in fine
ness, sparkle and purity will compare
favorably with the product of the best
refineries.
An inspection of the factory was made
lew days ago by Gazette representa-
tive under the guidance of Assistant
Superintendent WOOdall, who explained
the different processes by which ten tons
OF beets we're taken from the fields and
within few hours a ton of fine granu-
lated sugar was sewn in sacks, ready to
ship to market.
Process of Manufacture
Reduced to plain English, the making
OF beet sugar seems simple enough. The
juice of the beet is extracted, the album
nOids removed, the juice filtered, it's
aciduity corrected and made alkaline,
the juice boiled in vacuum until the con-
densed syrup candies. when it is dumped
In machine very much resembling
milk separator, which revOlves at the
rate of 1900 revolutions a minute,
throws OFF the mOlasses, leaving a sugar
that is washed, dried and sacked, and is
then ready for use. The actual opera
lions by which this result is obtained
are not so simple as the telling would
seem. To accomplish them requires the
constant employment of ninety men iD
the factory, divided into two twelve
hour shifts, with an initial investment of
100000.
Come in BY Carloads
The beets are brought TO the factory
in carload lots, and also by farmers in
wagons, and are first stored in long
rooted shed, of which there are three
each holding 500 tons of beets In the
center OF each of these sheds, is a trough
through which flows a stream of water
BY this stream the beets are conveyed to
the factory, and automatically are
washed, weighed and fed into the slcing
machine, which cuts the beets into
cOssettes, or shreds, each about the size
and length of small lead pencil. These
shreds are packed into the cells of the
diffusion battery. There are fourteen
cells in the battery, each OF which will
hold $500 pounds OF beet shreds. But
twelve cells are connected up at once, of
the other two one being in the process of
emptying, while the other is being filled.
" dbCi is IuIO Tic CSlIS dU u bClIl-
perature of about sixty degrees, and the
process of driving out the sacharrine
properties of the beet begins, the sweet
beet juice being supplanted in the cOss-
etts by the water The fluid from each
cell passes through the next cell, extract
ing the sacharrine properties of each
cells charge as it goes. In twelve min
utes on an average the sacharrine value
of diffusion cell full of beet cOssettes
has been extracted, the cell is opened the
beet pulp is dumped and the cell charged
again. About every fifth or sixth cell in
the battery the beet juice is drawn, and
is pumped to the measuring tanks, and
then TO the mixing tanks where about
ten per cent of milk of lime is added, and
after a thorough stirring the sacharate
of lime is pumped into a carbOnatlOn
tank, where carbOnic acid gas is added,
which precipitates the lime, carrying
with it the albumnoids that were in the
beet Juice. An elaborate system Of
filtering follows, the liquid being forced
through closely woven iute cloths, the
lime and other impurities forming lime
cake in the filters The beet juice is now
q thin liquid, slightly green in color, and
with a sugar value of from II to 70 per
per cent The juice is now evapOrated
in what is termed the quadruple effect,
four immense watts, in which steam pipes
are contained in cells. and is then
pumped into the sulphitation tanks,
where the natural acidity of the beet
Juice is changed into an alkaline. The
beet Juice has become a syrup and the
making of sugar actually begins. The
beet syrup, now become dark greenish
brown in color liz fed into a vacuum tank,
and boiled at a temperature OF 65 to 20
degrees until candy is formed. Then
the candied mass drops into a mixer,
where a set of revolving knives, stirs it
around aud about, until it becomes a
plastic mass of syrup and sugar mixed.
A charge of this, about 400 pounds, is
dropped into a centrifugal machine,
which, whirling about at the rate of
1900 revolutions a minute, quickly
throws off the thick syrup still un-
candied, leaving the sides OF the receiver
with thickness of sugar OF a light
brown color. A hose with a sprinkler
nozzle, through which is pumped a
stream of water slightly impregnated
with ultra-marine blue, throws a spray
on the rapidly revolving sugar mass, land
the light brown color fades into white,
and within ten minutes OF the time the