The silver state. [volume] (Winnemucca, Nev.) 1909-1925, 1917-07-31
4 PEANUT TALE

Texas has 1000, 900 acres Of land
which could be easily planted to pea
nuts with a certainty of a large yield
declared State Senator Woodward Of
Erath county, Texas. who was in
Washington recently. THE time IS
coming when in Texas alone the value
of the peanut crop is going to run
into millions of dollars annually. The
b~y-products of this crop are going TO
of extraordinary value. The
nuts are now being crushed in the
mills. and from them an oil is ex-
tracted which, after refining, can
hardly be told from the best quality
of olive oil"
1t is a pretty safe bet that "the pea
nut king of Texas" as Mr.. Woodward
has been styled. if the question of
protection to Texas peanuts, or the
reyenue-only duty of the present
Democratic tariff law, were put
squarely before him. would be as
rabid for protection as is his agri-
cultural peer, Mrs. +. c. Dodd, known
as "the onion queen of Texas" who Is
strong for protection-on onions, at
least.
The peanut raised in Texas is of the
Spanish variety. a small, sweet nut,
rich in oil. 1t is used chiefly for its
oil, and for candies. They are grown
around Petersburg. Va, and several
other counties in that State, and IN
North Carolina. Before the war the
market on this nut averaged about
81 a bushel, but Mr.. Woodward ex-
poets to get S2.40 this year on a 30
bushels-to-the-acre yield pretty
good war" garden.
In Virginia the yield of this nut is
said to be about twenty bushels to
the acre, and the cost per acre to
harvest, before the war broke out,
was so great that competition raised
hob with the profits of the growers.
AS one prominent Virginia handler Of
the nut declared: Every time any
foreign peanuts commence to be of
fered in the towns of New York. or
in Boston, or Philadelphia, or any of
those points, it simply demoralizes
our market. We sometimes have
weeks when you cannot sell a pea
nut at any price to one of the clean
ers."
OF course this Spanish peanut, n
the trade, is more or less intimately
connected with the Virginia (the more
generally known variety. Peanuts
are not classified in the tariff law,
but from 1889 to 1909 their produc-
ton in this country increased some
285 per cent. and during the entire
twenty years the industry was pro-
tected. Even the Wilson, German tar
iff law of 1894 spared it.
But it Jared pretty badly under the
present law. prior to the outbreak OF
the war. The duty on both the I'M
shelled and the shelled peanuts was
cut rs per cent, with the usual result;
in 1913, under protection, we imported
but $500, 900 pounds of shelled, and
IL, $780, 900 pounds of the unshelled
nuts; in 1914, nine months of the Will
son-Underwood tariff law, we import
ed of the two, respectively, 27,077, 900
and 17,472, 900 pounds. Last year war
conditions cut the importation some
what, and of the two, respectively,
there were 1898, 900 and 6.739.000
pounds; and it is interesting to OBJ
serve that, because of cheaper pro-
duction cost, Japan is rapidly taking
the trade away from Spain. For the
ten months ended April last We i'm
ported of the unshelled $4,000 and
of the shelled 1887, 900 pounds. What
the importation will be when the war
is over no one a say, but here is the
great unprotected market lying fall
low for anyone who now wishes it.
Does not Mr.. Woodward believe that
a restoration of the Republican pro-
tariff would be. advisable?