The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-07-28
THE OYSTER AND THE CRAB.
WHENCE COMES THE UNExHAUsTI-
BILE SUPPLY.

uHefeE IEauc-lhdt lily nus Also
One-third of the Annual Output.
over 4O0,0OO.OOO Bushels Have
Gone Out of Maryland Waters i'm
the Last Fifty Years-The Different
Branches of the oyster Trade-The
Uses to which Oystel shells Are
Put-Facts About Oyster Culture.
Grabs and the Grabbing Industry.
other Matters of Interest.
Washington, July 26.-As nearly
everybody considers himself an epicure
and all epicures are fond of oysters,
it stands to reason that our home pop
ulation of ninety-eight odd millions
must consume an enormous quantity
of them, to say nothing of the tons
upon tons of bivalves that annually
travel in tin cans to the uttermost
parts of the earth. Yet how few of
us have ever stopped to think whence
comes this apparently inexhaustible
supply Now it is we'll known that the
News readers desire to be posted on
all topics of interest under the sun;
therefore l have spent several days
looking up the bivalve business, inter-
viewing representatives of the United
States Fish Commission, and even
making a trip down the Potomac to
the oyster beds. Aud this is the re-
suit of my Investigations;
Maryland, My Maryland the sleepy
little state of the old war song from
which a chunk was distracted, like
Adams rib. to help create he Dis
trict of Columbia-is the great head
center of the oyster trade, its most
townless waters yielding twice as
many of the succulent mollusks as are
grown in all the foreign countries OF
the globe put together Baltimore, the
only city of consequence in Maryland,
annually handles at least one third OF
the total oyster product of the world.
During the last sixty years-which is
as far back as the records are come
atable-upwards of four hundred mill
ions of bushels of oysters have gone
out of Maryland, not counting the
enormous amount which has also been
used for lime. Computing from the
average wholesale price, these mol
lusks have sold in the markets for a
sum of money approximating $250,00O,-
000-about four times as much as the
present entire valuation of all the tax
| able property in the Maryland coun-
| ties where the fisheries are pros
! ecuted-of course, not including the
| city of Baltimore. The output of the
industry is equal in value to about one
sixth of all the fisheries of the
! United States combined. Nearly every
part of this country is more or less de-
| pendent for the abundance and cheap
ness of it's oyster supply on the yield
of the Chesapeake and the streams that
| flow into it, as are also foreign con-
sumers of the canned meats. But
| then no other state in the Union has,
| in proportion to it's area, so great an
| inland water surface as Maryland, and
| the oyster industry is carried on in
| eleven of it's twenty three counties. In
| these eleven, because of the innumer-
able tributal .es of the Chesapeake in
tending into the land there are few
localities removed further than six
miles from navigable water thus bring
| ing all the residents into close con-
tact with the fisheries. The latter are
the chief means of support for the $780,
900 Tor thereabouts), population of the
eleven counties referred to-always
leaving Baltimore out of the count.
The oyster markets of Maryland en-
| ploy more capital than the fisheries
themselves, and give work to perhaps
half as many persons. Everybody
knows that Baltimore is far and away
the biggest oyster market in the world.
| but comparatively few are aware that
the business of selling and shipping is
conducted on colossal scale in several
other Maryland towns. Crisfield ranks
next to Baltimore in that regard,
land there are others"
The marketing trade is divided into
three branches-the raw shocking
| trade, the steaming trade and the trade
| in oysters an natural, so to say. The
most important is the raw shocking
| trade. In Baltimore alone there are six
ty firms engaged in shocking oysters
for the raw trade. The shucking is
done by an army of persons. aggregat-
ing thirty-five thousand. male and fe-
male. Some firms employ women ex-
clusively, and in all the shucking es-
Establishments they figure conspicuously
| along with the men, black and white
together, but black predominating. The
work requires strength as we'll as skill
and is very fatiguing. I tried 1t my
self, as an experiment, and after about
half an hour, with the aid of chisel and
Ratchet, and the main strength of sew
eral on-lookers, succeeded In prying
| open one big bivalve and blistering my
| fingers for a month to come. On ac-
| count of the strength and endurance
required men, as a rule make more
money at the business, being able to
open more shucks in a day than a
| woman; but then, in this chivalrous
age they get better paid anyway, in
| all branches of business, than females,
| though the latter accomplish the same
amount Of work and do it as well. So
one could not expect the Marylanders
to do any better by the weaker sex
than other folk. The average price for
shocking oysters is twenty cents per
cup" of nine pints wine measure.
Next in point Of magnitude is the
steaming trade, which is located in Bal
timore, where are prepared over nine
| tenths of the worlds product of steam
J ed canned oysters. The preserving OF
| foods In Theoretically scaled tin cans
was begun in this country about 1854,
salmon and Holsters being among the
first products thus prepared. -Four
years later the process was extended
| to oysters. At first they were boiled.
in kettles-and rendered about as juicy
and digestable as so many bits of sole
leather. In 1860 scalding was substi-
tuted making considerable improve
ment, and soon afterwards the present
method was evolved. which is probably
as near perfection as can be, render
ing the timed oysters, II properly treat
ed when the can is opened, almost in
distinguishable from fresh ones. Some
twenty-five or thirty Baltimore firms
are now busy as bees at this branch