RURAL IIAXUFACTUREH 291 



With the establishment of the beet-sugar industry, 

 sorghum culture languished. The Thirteenth United 

 States Census reported 416 acres of sorghum in the 

 State in 1909, yielding 2,7r)r) tons of cane, valued at 

 $18,595. In the period of the great war one occa- 

 sionally heard of Michigan-grown sorghum as a 

 substitute for sugar in a time of great scarcity, but 

 sorghum culture seems now to have become an aban- 

 doned phase of Michigan agriculture. On the basis 

 of census returns, the United States Department of 

 Agriculture records the production of sorghum in 

 Michigan as follows : In the year 1859, 86,953 gal- 

 lons of sirup; 1869, 91,686 gallons; 1879, 102,500 

 gallons; 1889, 45,524 gallons; 1899, 24,059 gallons; 

 1909, 21,350 gallons.^ These figures are admittedly 

 incomplete, since small quantities of sirup produced 

 were unreported. 



The beet-sugar industry in Michigan had its origin 

 in experimental efforts by the Michigan Agricultural 

 College, which demonstrated the adaption of the 

 State for sugar-beet culture. As far back as 1881, 

 the State legislature had provided a bounty of two 

 cents a pound and tax exemption to encourage the 

 creation of a domestic sugar supply. Nature had 

 provided a delicious but inadequate sugar product 

 derived from the sugar maple growing everywhere in 

 both peninsulas. First the Indians and then the 

 white pioneers had exploited this native source of 

 sugar, but it was wholly insufficient to meet the grow- 



nj. S. Dept. Agr.. P'armers Bull. 477: "Sorghum-Sirup 

 Manufacture," Washington. 1912, 1918, 



