The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-05-21
OUR FRIENDS THE MILLERs.

OUR FRIENDS THE MILLERs.
BY way of variety the city of conventions
will be honored to-day by the presence of
the National Association Of Operative Mil
lers. If there is any more ancient or honor
able occupation than the one they repre-
sent it is not recorded, for the human race
must have begun 10 grind corn about as
soon as it began to be cut, and the necessity
for the operation has been continuous. An
exhibit Of the different modes of doing ii
from the earliest times TO the present, or
even of those now prevailing among diff
ferent peoples, would be an interesting OBJ
ject lesson. 1t is a long way from the
primitive stone or modern mortar through
various stages of hand, water. wind. ami
NAL and steam power to the great modern
plants that turn out the finest -four so
cheaply that the poorest can afford to buy
it, 1t is a long way, too. from the rustic
miller of old times who worked and sung
from morn till night, no lark more blithe
than he" singing perhaps because he had
nobody to talk TO and for lack of a human
chorus, singing his song with that of the
running water and the wheels it turned.
10 the prosperous manufacturer of these
days who works chiefly with his brains
and runs mills as other magnates do rail-
roads The latter would be as much out of
place in one of the old-fashioned grist
mills of early times as the country miller.
OF those days would be in charge of a big
modern plant.
The milling statistics of the last census
have not been tabulated, so il is not known
how much capital is invested in the indus
try or what the value of its product is, but
the figures must be enormous. In the State
of New York alone there were 1513 estab-
lishments engaged in flour and grist mill
ing in 1900, and the product was val
ued at $42, 79634O. It is claimed, by
the way, that the first grist mill in
America was horse mill set up on the
Island OF Manhattan. The early Dutch set
tiers introduced wind mills, while the
English took to water mills. Before the
close of the seventeenth century New York
was making -four for an export trade. With
the settlement of the Genesee valley a great
milling industry sprang up at the falls of
the Genesee. Rochester. laid out in 1872, be-
came the Flour City and held the lead
in the business for a long time. In this
however. as in everything else. the West
was most progressive, especially in adopt
ing new milling processes. Between 1870 and
1890 Minneapolis came to the front as the
great milling center, and now Minnesota
holds first rank, even ahead OF New York
In fact the product in New York fell off
considerably in the last decade, and at
present that State has only few mills of
large capacity. Most of the 1918 mills in the
State are scattered in cities and villages
and do only custom grinding. 1t is not like
ly that Minneapolis will ever lose the su-
| premacy she now enjoys as the most i'm
! portant milling center of the country The
| immense water power supplied by the Mis-
sissippi river. which is nearly a thousand
feet wide there and with a fall of seventy
five feet within the space of a mile, cannot
be surpassed anywhere, and the great plants
already established there are not likely ever
| TO be excelled' in capacity and equipments.
| The annual output of the Minneapolis
mills is not known, but they probably pro-
duce the largest part of the -four we export,
which in 1900 amounted to IS 632, 900 barrels.
The millers are welcome 10 Indianapolis.
which, If not a milling center, is the center
of several other attractions. besides being
almost the center of that which makes mill
ing profitable, namely, the population of
the United States. The millers can feel per-
fectly at home here, for this is a bread
eating community, and its members feel
kindly towards those who supply the -four
of the family.