PRACTICAL PAPERS—SUGAR-BEET AND BEET SUGAR. 228 
THE SUG^E-BEET AND BEET SUGAR. 
From the Reports on the Paris Exposition of 1867, published by the U. S. Government. 
BY HENRY F. Q. D. D’ALIGNY, OF MICHIGAN, 
Late U. S. Commissioner. 
HISTORY OP THE CULTIVATION OF THE BEET FOR SUGAR. 
Ii: 1747, Margraff, a Prussian - chemist, read before the 
Academy of Berlin his memoir on the existence of a sugar in 
the beet identical with that in the cane. It was not, however, 
until fourteen years after this that this discovery found its 
first application. Achard, another chemist of Berlin, repub¬ 
lished the discoveries of Margraff, and it is to his indefatigable 
industry and perseverance that we owe the first practical 
methods used in the manufacture of beet sugar. 
From 1789 to 1796 Achard devoted himself to the culture 
of the beet and experiments in sugar-making at his farm at 
Caulsdorff, near Berlin, at the end of which time, with the as¬ 
sistance of the government, he founded at Kunern, in Silesia, 
a manufactory which proved to be successful, and was soon 
followed by the erection of two other similar establishments. 
This, was the origin of the manufacture, which is to-day rep¬ 
resented by so many establishments in France and in various 
parts of Europe. 
The results of the labors of Achard were published in 1797. 
The Annaks de Chimie in 1799 contained a letter from him in 
which he described the processes used by him in the manu¬ 
facture of beet sugar, and the cost of the manufactured arti¬ 
cle ; in the same letter he also forcibly presented the advan¬ 
tages which would result to agriculture by the introduction of 
this new industry. 
