CHAPTER XI. 

 THE TBANSPORTATION OF WHEAT 



The transportation of wheat has four divisions or aspects: 

 (1) Transportation from the farm to the local market; (2) from 

 the local market to the primary market; (3) from the primary 

 market to the seaboard ; and (4) from the seaboard to the 

 foreign market. 



Transportation from Farm to Local Market. On the Pacific 

 coast of the United States all wheat is handled in sacks from 

 the time it is threshed. This is the method of handling wheat 

 in practically all foreign countries. Perhaps the only excep- 

 tions to this are in very recent times in certain parts of Russia 

 and in western Germany. In all parts of the United States 

 except the Pacific coast, however, advantage is taken of the 

 flowing quality of wheat by handling it in loose condition as 

 soon as it reaches the elevator, and in some parts, as in the 

 Red river valley, it is never sacked at all, but runs directly 

 from the thresher into the wagon box or grain tank. In 

 transporting wheat from the farm to the local market animal 

 power is well-nigh universally used, whether it is transported 

 on the back of the camel, as in Egypt or India; in the two- 

 wheeled ox-cart, as in Argentina; in the two-horse wagon, as 

 in Ohio; in the four-horse grain tank, as in North Dakota; or 

 on the six-horse, double wagon, as on the Pacific coast. 



Transportation from Local Market to Primary Market. The 

 fact that the production, the internal movement, and the ex- 

 portation of wheat are greater in bulk and value for the 

 United States than for any other country attaches an un- 

 usual interest to a study of the internal transportation of 

 American grain. Those great railway centers into which the 

 wheat of the surplus producing states is concentrated after the 

 first stage of its movement from the producer are designated as 

 the primary grain markets. The ten largest centers are Chi- 

 cago, Minneapolis, Duluth-Superior, St. Louis, Milwaukee, To- 

 ledo, Kansas City, Peoria, Cincinnati and Detroit. An average 

 of from 10,000,000 to 90,000,000 bushels of grain has been an- 

 nually received by each of these cities. With one exception, 



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