The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1913-07-22

nave 10 deal withthe things North Car
Ohna mills sell or buy, the revelation is
understood 1t is a question whether
Nortn Carolina is today the first or
second cotton manufacturing State
Inc cOtt :" world knows the sit
uatiOn p,'L Ona-tor+h - -,
the hant it, ~ ~. -.
,aroltna. ;na,Itn The CO., 0'Rls thief
n,,a VI Nortl Caron- Dying
over nifty thousand hands,
but there are in the State not less
tnan n1teen industries that turn o,,t
product Of not less than a million
dollars to the industry annually. To-
Dacco is the most important after cot
ton from the point of value of pro-
oucts, the tobacco factories selling
close to million dollars worth a
week. and carrying a pay roll of close
to ten thousand hands
The saw mills Of North Carolina are
important industries, as they employ
thlrty-hve thousand hands, and sell
tnlrty-hve to forty million dollars
worth of lumber a year. In spite OF
the reckless way in which the forests
have been cut down the lumber bust
ness IS big one, and will be for years
yet The pity is that it is one Of the
big industries of the present that can
not count on permanency
TWO allied industries Of the saw
mill are the tannery and the furniture
factory. North Carolina makes five
million dollars worth of leather a wear
and nearly a half more than that of
furniture, the furniture industry rank
Ing the State among the principal fur
nlture producing States. Fortunately
lumber can be grown fast enough to
supply the furniture maker with much
OF his raw material, as the experience
OF the furniture factories in some Of
the Northern States has shown SO
this Industry can be counted on as be-
ing of more lasting character than
other woodworking lines.
one OF the features Of the manu-
facturers of North Carolina is the
wide diversity of product. + noticed
the other day that High Point had
just closed an order for fifty electric
cars for Chicago, which means a hun
dred and fifty thousand dollars No
less than thirty different industries
have yearly product Of not less than
quarter of a million dollars Nearly
two dozen produce annually over half
a million. In these such things as
ice, bakery products, wooden and felt
goods and hats, patent medicines and
drug preparations, etc. are included.
Two or three hundred hands are en-
plOyed in the coffin trade. Eighteen
factories make confectionery twenty
three make mattresses. twenty-five ag-
ricultural implement works are in op-
GRAFTON. and maybe more since the fig
ureS were collected.
Nearly a thousand hands are en-
gagged in marble and stone work. A
similar number make mems clothing
Brick and tile worth over q million is
turned out, with wagons and carriages
that bring between three and four
million. Cotton seed products are
worth eight or ten million dollars and
new mills are building, as are new
factories of ali sorts. The grist mills
produce ten million dollars worth of
stuff in the year. Fertilizer factories
get up into the millions. and the bust
ness is growing with unprecedented
rapidity like the cotton seed product
industries. In ten years the furniture
industry has grown nearly five hun
dred per cent.
All this stuff sounds like merely an
array of figures. The pity is that hu-
man imagination cannot grasp it's sig
nifiCanCe more readily. Boiled down
to a simple statement it means that
, factories of North Carolina have
increased so rapidly that their pro-
duct. which a dozen years ago was
worth less than a million dollars q
week is now worth almost a million
dollars for each working day of the
year.
This is not the whole story. The
railroads have been overwhelmed with
the products of the factories. A mil
lion dollars worth of factory stuff
can not be hauled away every day
without some business. and that means
the employment Of a big army Of rail