The Bozeman courier., 1927-12-09

to mix our long staple with the short
staple Of India, would pay for the cot
ton. The result was satisfactory, and
the cotton trade grew very fast. We
made a rate from Minneapolis to Hong
kong that would enable the Chinese to (
ship flour. We found the necessity of /
permanent rates. We could not build |
up a permanent business, extending |
across the continent and even across the !
ocean, on the basis that tomorrow the
rate might be changed or the party with
whom we were working to reach the d1t-
ferent points of production or consump-
ton had some other interest or some
greater interest elsewhere. 1t was nee
eSsary that we should have some reason
able expectation that we could control
the permanency Of the rate and be able
to reach the markets.
Why Hill Bought the c., B. e. Q.
To read this is to be present at the
birth of a great idea; to watch the evo-
luton Of a worldwide plan, says Mr..
/ Pyle in his biography Of the great en-
pire builder. Mr.. Hill started originally
| to get business for the Great Northern.
First, he needed eastbound freight and
created a market for Washington and
Oregon lumber. That grew so fast that
he needed westbound freight, and created
a market for American products in China
and Japan. To distribute the lumber
widely where it was needed, and to gather
up the cotton and the steel that the
Orient wanted, he had to go far afield
through the interior and southern sec
tions of the United States. All this busi-
ness depended on low and settled through
rates. He must be in position to main
tain joint rates. as well as rates on the
Great Northern alone. Therefore he must
have an ally with lines which would give
access to Chicago and st. Louis, and also
cover the immense central region. The
Chicago, Burlington q Quincy would
best answer that purpose. And this line
he later purchased.
Mr.. Hills ideas carried far. His venture
? in taking rails from Chicago to Yoko-
: hama, in competition with the mills OF
Belgium and Great Britain, meant more
e than getting business for the Great
e Northern. It was casting down Of gage
] of battle. And If he were to change the
s course of normal trade currents from
] Europe through the Suez canal to his
own from the United States across the
e Pacific, he knew he would have to builc
= steamers larger than the worlds mer'
Y chant marine had ever seen to ply be-
{ tween Seattle and China and Japan. B!
= these he could lower the rate across th'
Pacific at his will.
In 1900 the Great Northern Steamship
a company was formed with a capital O
t So OOO, 600 and contracts were let for two
It mammoth steamships, the Minnesota
" and the Dakota" to ply between Seattle
.t and Yokohama and Hongkong. The.
D were to cost S2,50o,000 each, and to b.
d the greatest freight carriers ever floated
% The Minnesota" was launched in 1908
Is Her length was $50 feet, beam 73.4, dis
e placement $4,000 tons, and capacity %,
o 900 tons.
u Exports Increase $40 Per Cent
d, So long as business was left un
le shackled, 1t did not disappoint expecta
Is ton or refute calculation. In the 1
years from 1898, when the Great North
ID ern reached the Pacific coast, to 1908, tn
rs exports of the customs district Of Puge
d, sound increased $40 per cent. In singl
st year the exports Of cotton goods multi
Of piled by nearly five, and those Of RAJ
ct cotton By more than three. The har
D. work had been done. The market ha
ne been opened. The machinery had bee
es set in motion. Intelligent public COOP
Id Grafton would do the rest. Mr.. Hill sal
10 at the time:
ed ''The future Of this business remain
in to some extent a matter of conjectur
ne II all the railroad forces, the governmen
re and the laws unite to help this traffi
Puget sound viii be the greatest seapoi
lis Of the Pacific. It viii be the clearin
re point for the biggest volume Of Tomas
ey going to the Orient and coming from