The Billings gazette. [volume] (Billings, Mont.) 1896-1919, 1903-03-27
INDUSTRIES FOLLOW THE STAR
OF EMPIRE.
MANUFACTURING IN WEST
Unqualified Opportunities for Profit.
able Investment Of Capital,
Skill and Energy.

AA tAS "A~A Ma
number the growth Of manufacturing
industries in the west and presents
instructive statistics showing what
has been done and what may be done
with capital and skill, intelligently
directed. The abundance of raw ma
terial now shipped to other points
distant from the source to be convert
ed into manufacturing products JUS
titles the assertion that the west today
affords u%nequalled opportunities for
the u%pbuilding of profitable industries.
The paper quoted editorially says:
while the west has been develop
ing in population and has been en-
%deayoring to inaugurate new methods
OF agriculture, that it might be more
certain of it's crop returns, it has
said little Of is progress in the art
OF making things. The manufacture
ing impulse that has accompanied
the production of raw material has
worked it's way SO quietly that it has
been apparently one of the minor evil
dences of the progress in the western
and northwestern states. Yet it is
doubtful if there is today any one thing
that is of more Importance in the
vests development than this. The
fact that it is able to enter the manu-
featuring list and keep it's people m
ployed at other things than the rails
ing of crops is CT vast value to it's
ultimate growth and the permanency
of it's business conditions.
"The reasons for the vests move
ment in this direction are found in
the coming of men accustomed to
this life. The towns are filling up
as we'll as the country and the men
who are making their homes therein
are those with the manufacturing in
stinct. Then there is an investment
FUND in the west that is at the dis
posal of the business men who are
capable of handling it and of utilizing
the raw material that is so abundant.
IL Is IluIClIOuS IudI lie IduCulldll VI
Dakota should send his hides to Mas
sachusetts and then pay freight on
them back again in the form of shoes.
1t has been so proved, for n of the
most successful shoe factories in the
nation is in Minnesota, while others
are being located in other parts of
the prairie region. The breakfast
food industry has been centered in
Michigan for several years; now II,
is also becoming prominent III Mlnne-
apolis, Omaha and Kansas City,
where new factories are probable this
year. The wheat and oats are grown
at their door ana can be utilized
cheaply.
THE northwest is particularly in
dependent in this. The fuel supply
of the states along the northern bor-
der is abundant for the furnishing
of vast power; the rivers of the states
near the mountains are ready to give
the power to many mills; the timber
of the states farther west is of such
quantity and quality as to make the
development of the lumber industry
in all it's forms a most profitable in
vestment. Already these factors are
being utilized and the people are MAX
ing themselves the arbiters of the
new prosperity that has come to their
section.
There is plenty of money for this
development. Not all of it in the
west, but a large portion of it there.
The certainty of the large demand,
all the time growing larger as the
population advances by leaps and
bounds through the constant influx
of settlers, gives assurance that there
will be a market for the products
and the people who invest in the new
plants are the ones most familiar
with the conditions. In every town
of any size in the west some industry
is taking root. 1t may be nothing
more than a broom factory or a brick
works, but it is aiding to some extent
in. the new movement that is making
the west rich and is also making it
a rival to the casts long time suprem-
acy in such things.
How many realize that there are
in the western states, meaning those
between the Mississippi and the Rock
les, 5,287 manufactures with an
aggregate capital of $3,447, 5s7, 249 and
an annual product of $5,252, 311,029?
This includes some of the largest
mills in the world, the packing houses
that are the wonder of this age and