CHAPTER V 

 WHEAT 



BREAD is the staff of life. Whatever else we may have 

 on our tables we usually have bread. It is so com- 

 mon and necessary an article of food that we describe pov- 

 erty by saying, "Not a crust of bread in the house." 



Yet the bread that you and I eat wheat breads is really 

 a rather recent addition to the world's food. True, wheat 

 has been known for many centuries, so long that no one 

 knows when or where it originated. But not until the last 

 few generations has it been found possible to raise enough 

 so that the great mass of people can have it daily for food. 



But even yet wheat as a common article of food is 

 almost unknown in many nations. Probably more than 

 half the people living in the world to-day have never tasted 

 wheat bread such as we eat daily. Either wheat is not 

 grown, or it costs more than other foods and can not be 

 afforded by the common people. In its stead they eat rice, 

 barley and vegetables. 



1. Importance of Wheat as a Crop 



The United States raises more wheat than any other 

 nation, and approximately half as much as all Europe com- 

 bined. We supply about one-fifth of all the wheat grown 

 in the world. Our annual crop is nearly 700,000,000 bush- 

 els, enough if loaded into cars to make two solid trains, 

 one reaching from New York to San Francisco, and the 

 other from Regina to New Orleans. 



The wheat belt of the United States. The best wheat 

 producing regions are in the Middle West and North. Kan- 



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