The sun., 1907-04-14
SHIPPING EGGS BY MILLIONS.
FROM ALL OVER THE COUNTRY
THEY CONE TO NEW YORK.
Facts and Figures About This Part OF New
Works Food supply y-EarIy In the Year
Texas Begins TO ShIp-At the End
the DakOtas Are the Chief Producers.


the DakOtas Are the Chief Producers.
The four million residents of this city
would be helpless If the produce and pro-
vision dealers did not ransack the continent
and the railroads did not bring flesh. fish
and fowl and the products of the grain
field and the orchard.
At breakfast at an uptown hotel a whole
sale grocer of Pittsburg, who understood
something of the problems of food supply,
said TO his companion that he wondered
where all the eggs that are eaten in New
York come from. Here is the answer
When the December chill leaves The
hens of Kentucky and Tennessee, Arkansas
and Texas get busy. their industry con-
tinuing throughout January and February.
The spring, travelling north in March
and April stirs the hens in southern Illinois.
Missouri and Kansas. In May and June
northern Illinois. Iowa and Nebraska and
in July and August Wisconsin. Minnesota
and the Dakotas send us eggs. Every day
or perhaps two or three days a week the
farm and the hennery send baskets OF eggs
TO the country storekeeper, who rays for
them in money or merchandise, packs them
in cases and sells them to the shipper in one
or another Of the large receiving markets.
Here the cases are loaded compactly in
refrigerator cars, IN NfcEr~ '-ca rf5;rf
and often by trainload they move TO the
great industrial and commercial centres.
They do not all come TO New York. Even
Chicago has 10 have eggs, to say nothing
of other places, but from this interior and
Western region, from Texas on the south
to the Dakotas on the north, there came
70 New York in 1905 4,0S8 ISL cases, con-
tanning about l26 $40 1881 dozens, or ,520,-
O4Sl72 eggs. Eggs come to New York from
Jersey, from upstate farms and from
Long Island, but in quantities that are
negligible when compared with those from
the interior.
the grocer for eggs, but she does not know
0nat the price she pays a dozen during the
season of shipment seldom exceeds by
more than five cents the price received by
the Western farmer who takes them to the
country store. During times Of scarcity
the price may run up to 10 or 20 cents a
dozen higher than the farmer receives.
The rate of transportation does not change.
The railroads receive 30 cents case tor
bringing eggs in refrigerator cars from
Indiana and Illinois and 90 cents a case
from Texas and Minnesota. That is, the
railroads bring eggs thousand miles to
New York for a cent or cent and a half a
dozen and 1000 miles OF so for about two
cents and half a dozen. The transporta-
ton charge that il paid the railroads has
no bearing whatever on the retail price in
New York. If the railroads performed
their service gratis the consumer in all
probability would pay just a. much for his
eggs The average price at Wholesale
in 1905 was 10 cents dozen. and the total
valuation Of the eggs received in Greater
New York. both for domestic consumption
and for export. was s24,O87 ,i3e.
From MAY 10 July. the season during
which the greatest number Of hens are in
dustrous, vastly more eggs come to New
York than the population consumes. The
surplus il placed in cold storage for use in
the hate autumn and the early winter.