The Daily Missoulian. [volume] (Missoula, Mont.) 1904-1961, 1909-07-04
The MON TANA WOOL
WANTED
ST. PAUL BUSINESS MAN sUG.
GEsTs SPINNING OF IT At
SOME WESTERN CITY.

~ ooaP htiIlt July o. w HN 1OL
spin and manufacture Montana wool
IN st Paul and the other great~.com-
mercial cepters of the Northwest ?"
This is the question put by leading
st. Paul business man whose attention
has been largely drawn to Montana by
the recent excursion of leading mer-
chants through that state by special
train. He asserts, and his opinion is
backed by tho belief OF number of
prominent men, that q concerted effort
would be suifiient to establish the
manufature of wool products in the
Northwest. and divert to the home ter
rltory an immense amount of business
Which is now handled by far eastern
manufacturers of yarn. knit goods and
all the products into which western
wool enters.
Montana wool passes through Min
nesota and transfers at St. Paul annu-
ally by the hundreds of carloads" this
authority continued. 1T goes largely
to the Boston market there to be sold
to spinners of yarns and other users
Of the raw material. The yarn is spun,
II enter into manufactured articles, thu.
manufactured product is sold at eastern
sale warehouses at ST Paul and from
this point sold in small lots back into
the very territory where the original
WOOL was grown. From the time the
wool leaves the back of the sheep it is
almost continuously journeying, only to
make considerable circuit of the
United States and return to the terri
tory where it was grown.
1T is improbable that the whole
wooden industry will ever move west
ward, but it is time to give much at
tention to these following points:
The water of the Mississippi river
at st Paul and the waters OF num-
Der of our own streams are we'll adapt
ed to the washing processes of tho
manufacturers of yarns.
Experiments.
Practical experiments in the manu-
facture of knit goods of wool have
already been successfully carried on in
this general location and the manufac-
turers have found it easily possible to
build up large and profitable trade.
Wool manufactured at st Paul or at
other centers having the best of mod
ern distributing facilities, will save
freights to the seaboard and return.
Wool manufactured into yarns in
this territory means the immediate
growth of large industries prepared to
take the yarns and other products of
the raw material and convert them into
the finished products. which have a
large sale throughout the entire west
and are now manufactured almost en-
tirely in the east
IT has been proven that underwear.
blankets and many other articles sub
ject to a continuous and dependable
demand can be manufactured with great
profit in this territory, yet in several
cases the weaving and knitting ma
chimes are supplied with their material,
not from home institutions converting
the raw wool, but from eastern con-
Germs.
Gets Grip
The east got a grip on the wool
business during the period when wool
growing was an eastern industry. be-
fore the Montana plains had become
the center of production for the raw
material Once established, all influ-
ences have tended to keep the manu-
facturers of the raw material in the /
east. apparently against the CONNER
cial law that manufacturing can be
most profitably conducted other condi- |
lions being equal near to the source Of
raw material and near to the market
for the finished product. 1t is prob
ably hopeless now to think that the |
west can ever hope to take the bulk |
of the manufacturing from it's present
centers, but there is no reason why
eastern manufacturing should not be
divided and sufficient proportion
lodged at western centers of distrbu-
ton to care for the western demand |
for finished goods. In many articles, |
naturally requiring national advertis-
ing, such. for instance. as hose, under
wear and many lines of goods manu-
featured in whole or largely of wool.
the western demand is now sufficient
to warrant q concerted effort to pro-
duce in the west 8 sufficient bulk If
these goods to mekc up Independent OF
lie east"