FIFTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART I. 31 



<:ars of larger capacity, and today the horse-power of our largest locomotives 

 is about equivalent to the horse-power of the great walking beam Corliss 

 engine exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, which drove all 

 the machinery at Machinery Hall. Those of you who remember this engine 

 (which is now to be seen driving the Pullman Car Shops at Chicago) will 

 remember that the engine alone, without the boiler, seemed to be a mon- 

 strous affair. Since then we have learned to develop in much more compact 

 space, an equal horse-power. 



But you may ask me what is the object of reducing the cost of transpor- 

 tation. The object has been two fold: First, without reducing the cost of 

 transportation with the higher cost of wages, higher cost of material, and 

 especially fuel, with the higher cost of our sleepers, or ties (because the 

 •country is fast becoming denuded of its forests) every railroad in the country 

 would go into bankruptcy; secondly, railroad transportation officers have 

 discovered that as they reduce rates they create business. 



In order to explain this matter, I might return for a moment to my illus- 

 tration about the supplies required by a great city. The distance from which 

 its supplies will be drawn depends upon two factors: First, the transportation 

 facilities (that is to say, the service which is available), and second, the cost 

 of the service. 



I need tell no man in this room that the price which he will get for his 

 grain or his livestock on his farm in Iowa is the price at Chicago, or Kansas 

 City, or St. Louis, or some other market, less the cost of transportation to 

 that point, and by cost of transportation I mean, of course, not only the 

 railway freight charges, but all the expenses incident to the movement of the 

 grain or the stock from the farm to the market. Now, obviously, the better 

 the facilities grow, and the lower the rates are, the further will Chicago or 

 any other market reach out for the products of the mine, forest and the har- 

 vest field. As a case in point I might cite that not long ago a movement of 

 grain was started from the State of Oregon for the Chicago market. The 

 farmers of Oregon were able to take advantage of the high price of wheat at 

 Chicago, because of the transportation facilities which the railways were able 

 to offer them. In former times, the grower in Oregon was dependent 

 wholly on the Liverpool market and on the sea-going rates around Cape 

 Horn. 



I have touched on several phases of my subject, and there is a good deal 

 more that might be said along the same lines, but I wish to say a word 

 about another matter in which you will perhaps be interested; that is the 

 relation of the transportation interests, and especially the railway transpor- 

 tation interests in de\reloping the country. We have in the employ of the 

 Burlington railroad a man whose sole duty it is to look after the interests of 

 the railroad in developing business along its lines. He is called the Indus- 

 trial Agent. He is concerned not only in finding manufacturing concerns 

 who wish to locate on our line, but very particularaly in studying the condi- 

 tions in the country through which the railroad runs and ascertaining in 

 what way the products of the country may be developed and increased. 



' 'The splendid work of the Department of Agriculture at Washington, 

 and the agricultural schools, (notably in the State of Iowa, has the most 

 cordial endorsement of the transportation interests, and I need hardly dwell 

 on any phase of this question as you are to hear from Prof. Holden this 

 afternoon on the subject." 



