The San Francisco call., 1904-04-27
BY S. w. WALL.


CALL BUREAU, HOTEL BARTON,
WASHINGTON, April 26.-In the ag-
ricultural appropriation bill. which is
a part of the accomplished legislation
of this session of Congress, there is a
little item of $4,000 out of which, ac-
cording to an association Of American
manufacturers assembled a few days
ago in Washington, the members of
which represent an investment of many
millions, an immense benefit is to grow.
The $4,000 is to pay for experiments
in breeding up" the seed of the sugar
beet. AT the present time the sugar
beet is the most highly bred root in
the world, but the process of breeding
has only fairly begun and is to be con-
tinued right along under the supervi-
sion Of the Government and for the
benefit Of whomsoever- will. That there
are sugar beets-certain sugar beets-
whose lineage-mother, grandmother,
reat-grandmother and so on-can be
traced back through twenty genera
tions may be interesting news to the
layman. Sugar beet people know of
the long and patient travail by which
the industry finds itself where it is.
The $4,000 appropriated by Congress
is TO be expended in experiments to
be conducted on a certain farm located
few miles from Spokane, Wash,
owned by T. II. Morrison. The reason
Of this selection is that Mr.. Morrison
has been conducting experiments in his
own way so intelligently and success
fully as to have attracted the attention
and enlisted the sympathy of the Agri-
cultural Department of the Govern
ment. Mr. Morrison's seed beets are
said to have the highest percentage of
sugar contents yet reported of any
American grower. To reach conclu-
sions quickly and inexpensively. Secre-
tary Wilson dispatches his man to work
with Mr. Morrison on Mr.. Morrison's
farm.
CALIFORNIA BEET SUGAR.
The State of California leads all the
States of the Union in the pro-
duction Of beet sugar. The available
area for growing sugar beets success
fully is greater on the Pacific Coast
than elsewhere, extending from North
ern Washington to Southern Califor-
MIA, the line being drawn from about
Los Alemetos northeastward across
the map TO New York. leaving out all
the more Southern and Gulf States.
The sugar beet offers great possi-
bilities to the Western farmer. 1t is
a most profitable crop; a most inter
esting study; no other crop can COM
pare with il for turning the arid lands
Of the West into money-making acres.
The sugar beet, or its product, can
pay freight across the continent.
Corn. wheat, alfalfa-no other crop
can do it,
This is what Truman @. Palmer,
secretary of the American Beet Sugar
Association said to me.
MICHIGAN's GREAT PLANT.
In Pittsburg there were number
Of men who did not know what to do
with their surplus money-money
which they had made out of the man
ufacture of plate glass. A man went
there from Michigan and laid before
them a prospectus touching the manu-
facture of beet sugar and he did it so
effectively that they are about build
ing in the State of Michigan an enor-
nous plant with a -caplLal OF a DllllOn
dollars, a plant superior to anything
of the kind in the world for the manu-
facture of sugar from beets."
Senator Dolliver made this state
ment recently in a speech, as he said,
addressed TO the ear of the young men
of the United States, in which he un-
dertook TO shoY among other things
that opportunity waited upon brains
and enterprise in this country at this
moment as it has never done before.
The beet sugar reference was but a
point among many, but taken in con-
nection with other things it serves to
direct attention to what Mr.. Palmer
says is an opportunity. especially open
in the West.
When the Dingley tariff law went
into effect in 1897 there were just six
factories making sugar from beets.
This year there are fifty-six-alI do
ing big and profitable business where
a supply Of beets can be obtained. The
farmer must produce the raw material
before the factory can do business and
the first work of the manufacturer Ii