The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1914-10-30
HAULING NAMES BIG POTATO
CROP
1t Requires $4,000 Cars to Transport
the Annual Output Which Amouts
to 100000 Bushels.

to 100000 Bushels.
Suppose at the head of railroad
traffic department you had to solve
the problem of transporting about
nineteen million bushels of potatoes
to market in freezing weather, with
less than 5000 box cars, what would
you do? A few more statistics add
interest to the problem.
The road handles freight other than
potatoes. This also requires box
cars, for it aomunts to several hun
dred thousand tons annually, to use
round numbers. The average car
holds $50 bushels of potatoes, which
means that $4,000 cars will be ne
cessary to handle the crop.
In turn this means almost exactly
814 trains of thirty-five cars. In the
event that the locomotives are cap
able of handling forty-car trains, 101
trains less are necessary. The crop
can be handled by approximately in
713 trains. The shipping season is
spread over a period of seven months,
but seventy-fve per cent of the crop
is shipped in December, January, and
March.
This problem is not fanciful nor
imaginative; it fact. 1t is the prob
lem which the Bangor and Aroostook
Railroads traffic men solve.
The Bangor and Aroostook is,
practically, the only outlet Of Aroos-
took county, the great potato region
of Maine. At but four points in the
county is any. other road available.
To use the other lines means that
the shipper must send his goods from
seventy-five to one hundred and ten
miles farther than on the Bangor and
Aroostook.
The crop of the county during the
last season averaged twenty-three
million bushels. Eliminating the rot,
small, unmarketable tubers and those
retained for seed for ! this spring,
there is about nineteen million bush
els to ship. OF this amount fully
ninety-six per cent will pass over the
B. and A. This road has 2,687 box
cars. These cars must handle the po-
tatoes
At the commencement of the ship
ping season the big shippers, those
who load several cars day, were
given a number of cars to be used ex-
clusively by them. Immediately
these cars were converted into tenn
porary warm cars. This was done by
lining the cars, or sheating them with
matched lumber and installing a
stove. =.
1t costs about seventy-five dollars
to fit up a car. Because of this cost
the cars are assigned to the service of
one shipper for the entire season. No
dealer could afford to line a car for
one trip. Foreign cars do not help
the potato shipper. The name of the
man or concern to which the car has
been assigned is placed upon it. AS
quickly as it is unloaded the car is
rushed back to it's destination.
When the cars have been loaded
the stoves are fired. With each lot
the shipper sends man, who attends
to, the fire. Sometimes a man has.
two or three cars to look after, but
this rarely happens.
Once these cars start they are de-
layed only by wrecks. They are land
ed at destination as quickly as poss
iible. The average time for a car to
complete a round trip to Boston is
about two weeks; to New York a
week is added.
A portion of this potato crop is
shipped to the Bangor and Aroos-
looks seaboard terminal About two
train-loads, or seventy cars week,
go that way. These cars make a
round trip each week. In other
words, car used in sending potatoes
to the seaboard terminal makes twice
as many trips a month as one in the
Boston trade, and three times as