The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1903-07-08
TWIN CITY LETTER
State Grain Observation-Disclosures OF
InspectOrS-MuStS Serve Apprenticeship
How They are Xamined-MOdeSt
Whack at Pugh'S Civil Service Bill.
ESPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE. |

OF grain inspection in the foregoing
communication to show that the
work of inspecting for the state, at
the terminals, is neither simple nor
easy. 1t is hard, eXacting work,
and it calls for good judgment, keen
perception, and a cool head and lots
Of experience.
Men who have had few years
experience in buying wheat at
country points generally think
themselves qualified to inspect grain
for the state at the terminal points.
They are mistaken, every one of
them. A man might inspect grain
at a given locality, where the soil,
conditions and kind of seed are
similar, one year with another, and
become efficient so long as his efforts
were confined to that locality. And
if all these conditions were the same
at the Minneapolis and Duluth
terminals there is no reason why
he should not succeed as we'll
there. But they are not the same.
At the terminals the inspector
finds, when he goes to the railroad
yards in the morning, all kinds and
grades of grain, which came from
many different states-grain grown
upon all kinds of soil and under
every conceivable condition. One
car may be loaded with white wheat
from the Pacific coast; another with
red winter from the Kansas plains;
another with hard spring from the
Red River valley; another with
macaroni from the far north: an
other with "Chevalier" barley from
the bottom lands of Montana; an
other with fax seed from the
Dakotas. Other cars contain every
variety of corn, oats, rye, etc.
A new inspector, whose expert
ence had been confined to one
locality would find varieties, and
conditions of grain entirely new
and strange to him, and he would
simply become bewildered and
swamped. To go through string
of one or two hundred cars of such
kinds and qualities of grain and
give each car it's proper grade, and
this expeditiously enough to en-
able him to get his report in the
Office by 10 a. M, would be an i'm
possibility. For these reasons in
spectors are never taken from the
ranks of citizenship, but from those
who have had more or less ex-
perience in the department as
"helpers.
| When a man with an ambition to
become an INSPECTOR is taken into
the department he must begin as a
helper. This has been an infex,
ible rule from the beginning of the
department. No matter what or
how much experience he may have
had elsewhere or the extent of his
political ''pull," he must begin at
the foot of the ladder, and he is not
promoted until he is able to pass a
rigid examination. Of course a
man S former experience as hand
Ter of grain might be valuable to
him, and cause an earlier promo
ton; but be must show his merits,
not by his statements but through
his examinations and his work.
When new inspector is required
to fill a vacancy two or three of the
likeliest men among the helpers are
selected for examination. They are
sent out to different yards, each
morning for week or more where
each inspects string of cars, alone,
and reports his grades, car by car,
to the Office in the usual manner
After each one, an old inspector,
generally one of the assistants to
the chief deputy, goes over the
string and gives his results, no one
knowing what grades have been
marked by the other. The results
are then compared and the percent
age of correct grades given by the
new men are ascertained, measured,
of course, by the standard OF the
old inspectors. The man who passes
the best examination receives the
appointments; it matters not what
may be his nationality or religion