AGRICULTURAL INDUSTRIES 161 



bags of beans imported from foreign ports and thus 

 a competition is brought to bear with a home product 

 that a little knowledge would enable it to defy and 

 even become a rival in the very ports which now 

 send beans to us." 



Apparently Californians took to growing beans be- 

 cause they could not quiet their commercial con- 

 science over the sin of parting with so much of 

 the rapidly decreasing gold product in paying for 

 what they could produce themselves. The turn came 

 rapidly and much satisfaction is expressed in con- 

 temporary records over the fact, in connection with 

 the product of 1859, that the average of 20.56 bush- 

 els to the acre was set down in the United States 

 census of 1860 as higher than attained in any other 

 state, Connecticut following with 20 bushels and 

 South Carolina next with 18 bushels. In 1860 also 

 beans disappeared from the lists of products too 

 largely imported and exports began. The records 

 show the value of bean exports from San Francisco 

 as follows: 1861, $10,214; 1862, $40,507; 1863, 

 $11,608. The ability of the State to roll up a bean 

 surplus was demonstrated, but the high hopes of 

 profit were soon dissipated, for the crop of 1866 was 

 worth only $1.50 a bushel, which, at the average yield 

 stated, would give only $35 to the acre gross. There- 

 fore, it is not to be wondered at that the acreage 

 was reduced to one-half of that grown a decade be- 

 fore. Nevertheless, a local bean interest had been 

 awakened and the record says in 1867 : 



"Every known variety of bean has been tried and 



