MINNEAPOLIS AND ITS MILLS. 



589 



power, have a capacity for making 6,500 barrels 

 of flour daily, aud employ 281 persons. Their 

 new A mill of seven stories is carried up in two 

 distinct buildings, communicating by wrought- 

 iron tire-proof doors, and is fitted with thirty 

 run of stone, sixty sets of rollers, and machin- 

 ery for making the largest possible quantity of 

 flour of the best quality attainable from a given 

 quantity of wheat. The old-fashioned, rude 

 grinding of wheat and separating the flour is 

 replaced by methods that have been elaborated 

 with great skill, and which involve many pro- 

 cesses, employing varied machinery and in- 

 genious appliances. The chief objects sought 

 to be attained are the gradual breaking and 

 bruising of the grain so as to keep the broken 

 particles rough and "alive"; repeated reduc- 

 tions of the middlings, or that part of the grain 

 that lies immediately below the husk, which, 

 formerly treated as of inferior quality, is now 

 made to yield the strongest and best flour ; the 

 separation of every part of the flour from the 

 bran ; and the judicious blending of the flour 

 obtained from the several reductions. The 

 wheat, cleaned by blasts, is separated into lots 

 of similar sizes; the fuzzy tails are removed 

 by ending-stones. The grain is then passed 

 through corrugated, chilled-iron rollers, the 

 corrugations of which range from eight to 

 forty to the square inch, which bruise the grain 

 without grinding it. This is on the ground- 

 floor. The bruised grain is thence raised to the 

 bolting-machines, where it is passed through 

 gauzs cloths of different textures, and whence 

 it is sent down between finer corrugated rollers 

 running at a speed of from one hundred and 

 fifty to three hundred revolutions per minute. 

 These processes of reduction and sifting are re- 

 peated six or seven times, the third giving more 

 flour than the first two reductions, and the fifth 

 giving the best rising flour and the strongest in 

 albuminoids. About ten different grades of 

 flour are produced by these reductions, some 

 of them being mixed grades. As precautions 

 against accident, electric bells are connected 

 with different parts of the machinery, to give 

 the alarm on the occurrence of any choking or 

 other misadventure; and suction-pipes pass 

 from the stones and rollers to prevent heating 

 of the rapidly revolving surfaces, and to carry 

 the dangerous explosive dust into the upper 

 stories, where it is received by webs of flannel, 

 and is swept off and driven into a discharge- 

 tube by the automatic working of a traveling 

 brush. The warm air, thus separated from 

 dust, is returned to the mill and made to aid in 

 reducing the cost of heating. An electric proc- 

 ess has been tried for separating the flour from 

 the bran, but was found not to be effectual; 

 and a cleaner is used, consisting of iron disks 

 fitted with pegs, one set of which is stationary, 

 the other revolving at the rate of two thousand 

 revolutions in a minute, which strips every 

 particle of flour from the woody husk. The 

 bran is packed, while still fresh, in bags con- 

 taining two hundred pounds each, and is sold 



generally to dairymen, at prices ranging from 

 $6 at the mill, to $12 for two thousand pounds 

 at other places. 



C. A. Pillsbury's A mill will be, when fin- 

 ished, the largest mill in the world, and when 

 fully equipped will require a daily supply of 

 25,000 bushels of wheat. It is 180 feet long, 115 

 feet wide, and 117 feet high to the wall-plate. 

 The foundation side-walls, of limestone, are 

 eight and a half feet thick, and the walls even 

 as high as the seventh story are two and a half 

 feet thick. In the basement are the massive 

 fore-bay to convey the water from the canal 

 especially built for this mill, the flumes, and 

 provision for the turbine-wheels. Seventeen 

 thousand cubic feet of water rush every minute 

 with a fall of fifty-three feet down each flume, 

 and communicate to each turbine-wheel an 

 estimated force of 2,400 horse-power. The 

 mill is intended to contain, when completed, 

 twenty pairs of stones, with Behem's patent 

 exhausts ; three hundred sets of rollers, half of 

 them corrugated, half smooth, for finishing 

 work ; two hundred purifiers, fitted with Har- 

 denberg's dust-catchers; dust-machines and 

 separators of various kinds. Mr. Washburne, 

 of Washburne, Crosby & Co.'s mill, says that, 

 with skillful management of the modern ma- 

 chinery, be is able to procure as fine flour from 

 No. 3 or No. 4 wheat as was formerly obtained 

 from No. 1 or No. 2. A varying proportion of 

 different kinds of flour is made, according to 

 the demand and the quality of wheat used. 

 The ordinary out-put is forty per cent of pat- 

 ent, fifty per cent of baker's, and ten per cent 

 of low-grade flour. The foreign export trade 

 did not exist five years ago. The Washburne 

 mills now send thirty per cent of their product 

 abroad, chiefly as baker's flour. Belgium and 

 Germany have hitherto taken large consign- 

 ments, especially of low grades; but it is an- 

 ticipated that the increased duties will now shut 

 inferior brands out of Germany. Mr. Pills- 

 bury sends nearly half of his flour to Europe, 

 the most of it as baker's flour. Many English 

 bakers are said to use a mixture of three parts 

 of St. Louis flour with one part of the stronger 

 Minneapolis flour. From two hundred and 

 eighty to three hundred pounds of wheat, ac- 

 cording to the quality, are used to make a 

 barrel of flour. The bran, which is estimated 

 to constitute from eighty to ninety per cent of 

 this quantity, is expected to pay the expense of 

 the grinding, etc., and will do so when it can 

 be sold for its full price. 



Besides the extensive system of flouring-mills, 

 seventeen lumber-mills are in operation at Min- 

 neapolis, producing about 2,500,000 superficial 

 feet of lumber during the season. The timber 

 that is used is got chiefly from around the lakes 

 and the river-banks three hundred miles np 

 the Mississippi and its tributaries, and is near- 

 ly all white pine. Some oak and maple are 

 brought by railroad from the Eastern States, 

 and walnut and cedar are brought in small 

 quantities from Missouri. The logs are drift- 



