186 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



THE BEET-SUGAR INDUSTRY. 



The U. S. Department of Agriculture's report on 

 the beet-suger industry of the United States in the 

 years 1910-1911, recently issued by the Secretary 

 in a 73-page pamphlet which contains articles 

 on the work of the Bureau of Plant Industry on sugar 

 beets, a general review of the beet-sugar industry in 

 the United States, the sugar-beet in European agricul- 

 tural economy, relation of adaption to the improve- 

 ment of sugar-beet varieties for American conditions, 

 farm practice in the Arkansas Valley, Colorado, sug- 

 gestion on cultural methods in the sugar-beet industry, 

 and sugar statistics. It is illustrated by two -maps 

 showing areas where sugar beets are grown, location 

 of sugar factories, rainfall and frost data, and 6 other 

 plates relating to the industry. 



The average American consumes 82 pounds of 

 sugar each year and only ten pounds of that ration 

 is now produced in this country. The farmers of 

 the country should keep that money at home, in other 

 words, put it in their own pockets, and the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture has been trying for 16 years to 

 show them how and induce them to do so. 



Sugar is a product of manufacture mainly from 

 the farmers' sugar cane and sugar beets. Incidentally 

 some sugar is produced from the sap of the sugar 

 maple the entire value of that product, both sugar 

 and syrup, and the sorghum syrup, being only about 

 $15,000,000 annually, while the total value of the 

 sugar beet and sugar cane industries of this country 

 totaled $117,000,000. 



The cane sugar industry fared badly this year on 

 account of the Mississippi River flood, the entire pro- 

 duction including molasses and syrup being valued at 

 only $34,000,000. 



Beet sugar is a comparatively recent product of 

 this country, and can scarcely be said to have existed 

 20 years ago. The production during the 12th census 

 year (1899) amounted to 81,729 short tons, while the 

 1912 product aggregates 700,000 short tons valued at 

 $73,000,000. The growth of this industry and the 

 plans for its increase indicate that beet raising for 

 sugar purposes is much desired by farmers for profit 

 and cultural benefit to the land. 



There are now in operation 66 factories in 17 

 states, which used during the past season 5,062,333 

 tons of beets produced on 473,877 acres, and the in- 

 dustry has become one of the mainstays and chief 

 supports of agriculture under irrigation in the semi- 

 arid states. Yet this industry produces practically 

 only one-eighth of the home consumption. The im- 

 portation from entirely foreign territory now approx- 

 imates 2,000,000 short tons annually. A home beet- 

 sugar production sufficient to cut off this production 

 would not affect the home cane sugar industry ad- 

 versely, because that has so nearly reached its limit 

 that any possible growth it may have from now on 

 will not equal the annual increase in the country's 

 consumption, which has considerably more than 

 doubled in the past 25 years, and now is greater per 

 capita than any other country except England. 



With our present low average of 1'4 short tons 

 of beet sugar per acre, it would require 1,600,000 

 acres to produce the 2,000,000 short tons now im- 

 ported ; or. as the acreage harvested the last year was 

 slightly less than 475.000. it would need the produc- 



tion of 2,000,000 acres under beets to equal the entire 

 home demand, a condition to which for more than 

 80 years economists have lo.oked forward. 



In the 19 states adapted to growing beets there 

 are about 2 l /2 million farms, and 278,719,622 acres of 

 improved land. Therefore if every farmer in those 

 states could cultivate 1 acre of sugar beets, some of 

 the cane sugar from non-contiguous territory would 

 have to seek another market. Or if one fanner in 

 four in these states would plant a 3-acre patch and 

 give it the care that could readily be bestowed upon 

 so small a plot, it would be unnecessary for us to 

 buy foreign sugar. Two-thirds of one per cent of the 

 improved land in the states adapted to sugar beets 

 would accomplish this result, and more than that 

 acreage lies idle, absolutely unused, every year. Any 

 one of the states of Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, 

 Minnesota, Nebraska, or Ohio could produce all this 

 sugar and then have the beets come only once in a 

 ten-year rotation ; and several of the others could do 

 it alone on a 5-year rotation. The devotion of the 

 necessary 2,000,000 acres to the production of the 

 sugar required for our own consumption would have 

 an utterly insignificant effect in reducing the acreage 

 of other crops, and in fact, the growing of the beets 

 would actually increase the total yields of other crops, 

 because of the effect of the beets upon the soil, for 

 the thorough working of the soil necessary to grow 

 a profitable beet crop increases the yield of everything 

 else grown on the same ground in succeeding years, 

 and the beets need occupy the soil but one year out of 

 ten. 



20,000 SHOES A DAY. 



Mayer Boot & Shoe Co., Milwaukee, Now Has This 

 Daily Capacity. 



Milwaukee's great shoe manufacturing com- 

 pany, the F. Mayer Boot & Shoe Company, has just 

 completed another large factory building consisting 

 of seven stories and basement, 50x150 feet, which is 

 to be used exclusively in the manufacture of Martha 

 Washington Comfort Shoes. It is the largest single 

 factory in the country devoted entirely to the manu- 

 facture of one type of shoes. Including the new 

 Mayer Martha Washington building, the Mayer 

 factories now have facilities for manufacturing the 

 enormous quantity of 20,000 shoes per day. 



The remarkable growth of the F. Mayer Boot & 

 Shoe Company is a striking tribute to the sterling 

 qualities of Mayer Honorbilt Shoes, as well as to 

 the value of this paper as an advertising medium. 

 Mayer Honorbilt Shoes have been advertised in our 

 columns for years. Our readers must be familiar 

 with them and no doubt many are wearers of Mayer 

 Shoes. 



This company has built up an excellent reputa- 

 tion, which it deserves. The quality of Mayer 

 Honorbilt Shoes is known wherever good shoes are 

 sold. Martha Washington Comfort Shoes especially 

 enjoy a tremendous sale. On account of their great 

 popularity, these shoes are much imitated, and our 

 readers are warned to make it a rule when pur- 

 chasing to look for the names "Mayer" and "Martha 

 Washington" stamped on the sole. (Advertise- 

 ment.) 



