Commercial Geography Part 20

_Portland_, Me., has good harbor facilities, but is distant from the great lines of traffic. Steamship lines, which in summer make Montreal a terminal point, occasionally make Portland their winter harbor. _Newport News_, _Savannah_, _Charleston_, and _Brunswick_ are growing in importance as clearing ports for the cotton and produce from the region west of them. _Norfolk_ obtains importance on account of the United States Navy-Yard; it is also the great peanut-market of the world.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

What are the requisites of a good seaport?

What is meant by the draught of a vessel?

For what purposes are pilots?

How are navigable channels marked and designated?

From the Statistical Abstract find six or more of the leading exports from each of the following ports: New York, Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and the port nearest which you live.

FOR COLLATERAL REFERENCE

Statistical Abstract of the United States.

Statesman's Year-Book.

Industrial Evolution of the United States--Chapter II.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE UNITED STATES--THE NEW ENGLAND PLATEAU AND THE APPALACHIAN REGION

The manufacturing regions of the United States, which connect the country with the rest of the world, include mainly the New England plateau and the Appalachian ranges.

=The New England Plateau.=--This region embraces the New England States and practically includes all the eastern part of New York and northern New Jersey. The abruptly sloping surface affords a great wealth of water-power, and the region is one of the most important centres of light manufacture in the world. This industry resulted very largely from the conditions imposed by the War of 1812 and its consequent non-intercourse acts.

The interruption of foreign commerce not only cut off the importation of manufactured commodities, but also made idle the capital employed.

Manufacturing enterprises started in various parts of the United States, but they prospered in this region for three reasons--an abundance of power, plenty of capital, and business experience. Steam-power is largely supplanting water-power in the manufacturing enterprises, and in many instances the establishments have been moved to tide-water in order to get their coal at the lowest rates of transportation.

Chief among the manufactures are cotton textiles, the yearly output of which is about three hundred million dollars. About nine-tenths of the cotton goods made are consumed at home. Of the remainder, China purchases one-half. Great Britain and Canada take one-fourth, the South American and Central American states purchase most of the remaining output. The great improvement of spinning and weaving machinery has enabled the cotton manufacturer to export his wares to about every country in the world.

Boots, shoes, and other leather goods are also important manufactures.

The invention of improved machinery for making shoes has revolutionized the industry to the extent that a pair of stylish shoes may be purchased anywhere in the United States for about half the price charged in 1880.

Another result is the enormous importation of hides from South American countries and Mexico.

The New England plateau is also the centre of a large number of manufactures that require a high degree of mechanical skill and intellectual training, such as small fire-arms, machinery, watches and clocks, jewelry, machine-tools, etc. The location of such industries depends but little upon climate, topography, or the cost of transportation; it is wholly a question of an educated and trained people. This region is likely to lose a considerable part of its manufactures of cotton textiles, inasmuch as the industry is gradually moving to the cotton-growing region. The manufactures requiring training and skill, however, are likely to remain in the region where they have grown up.

_Lawrence_, _Lowell_, _Manchester_, and _Nashua_--all on the Merrimac River; _Lewiston_, _Waterville_, _Augusta_, _Woonsocket_, and _Adams_--each situated at falls or rapids--are great centres of cotton manufacture. Fall River has an abundance of water-power, and at the same time is situated on tide-water. Having the advantage of good power and cheap transportation, it has probably the greatest output of cotton textiles of any city in the world. Textile establishments have also grown up in the cities and towns of the Mohawk Valley, being attracted by the excellent facilities for transportation and also by the available water-power. _Lynn_, _Brockton_, _Haverhill_, _Marlboro_, and _Worcester_ are centres of boot and shoe manufacture; they turn out about two-thirds of the product of the United States.

_Bridgeport_ and _New Haven_ have very large plants for the manufacture of fire-arms and fixed ammunition; _Waterbury_ and _Ansonia_ for watches, clocks, and bra.s.s goods; _Meriden_ for silverware, and _Waltham_ for watches. _Worcester_, _Hartford_, _North Adams_, _Fitchburg_, and _Providence_ have each a great variety of manufactures.

The foreign commerce of these manufacturing centres is carried on mainly through _Boston_. _New Haven_, _New Bedford_, _Providence_, _Salem_, _Gloucester_, and _New London_ control each a very large local commerce.

South of New York Bay the Atlantic coast-plain attains an average width of nearly two hundred miles. The pine forests of this plain yield lumber, tar, pitch, and turpentine. The productive lands are valuable chiefly for their output of dairy stuffs, fruit, and "garden truck,"

which find a ready market in the larger cities. In order to encourage this industry, the railways make special rates for dairy products, fruit, and vegetables, and afford quick transit for such freight.

Manufacturing industries are rapidly taking shape in this part of the United States. Along the line where the coast-plain proper joins the foot-hills of the Appalachian ranges, the rivers reach the lower levels by rapids or falls. The estuaries into which they flow are usually navigable for river-craft. The manufacturer thus has the double advantage of water-power and low transportation. The opening of the southern Appalachian coal-mines has also greatly encouraged manufacture in this region. _Richmond_, _Columbia_, _Milledgeville_, _Augusta_, and _Columbus_ are thus situated. Their manufactures are very largely connected with the cotton-crop.

The domestic commerce of the Atlantic seaboard of the United States is probably larger than that of any other similar region in the world. It is considerably larger than the "round-the-island" trade of Great Britain. Much of this trade is carried by steam-vessels, but the three-masted schooner is everywhere in evidence, and these craft carry a very large part of the coal that is moved by water. This trade is restricted to vessels flying the American flag.

=The Appalachian Region.=--The middle and southern Appalachian region has become the most important centre of iron and steel manufacture in the world. This great development has resulted from several causes, the chief being the existence of coal and unlimited quant.i.ties of iron ore on the one hand, and unusual facilities for cheap transportation on the other. There are practically three areas of steel manufacture--one along the Ohio River and its tributaries in western Pennsylvania; another is situated along the south sh.o.r.es of Lake Erie and Lake Michigan; the third includes the Birmingham district in the southern Appalachians.

The steel-making plants of the Ohio River are located with reference to the transportation of their products, and therefore are built usually alongside the river. The coal or c.o.ke is commonly shipped in barges of light draught; the manufactured products are carried by rail. The greater part of the ore is brought from the Lake Superior region. It is shipped at a very small cost from the ore quarries to the lake-sh.o.r.e, and by rail from the lake-sh.o.r.e to the manufacturing plant. In order to avoid heavy grades the ore railways are also built along the river-valleys.

[Ill.u.s.tration: STEEL MANUFACTURE--ERECTING SHOP OF THE BALDWIN LOCOMOTIVE WORKS, PHILADELPHIA]

Some of the various steel-making plants are equipped for the manufacture of building or "structural" steel, others for rails and railway equipments, still others for tin-plate, or for wire, or for tool steel. In a few mills armor-plate and ordinary plate for steel vessels form the exclusive product. The diversity of the product has led to the organization of great corporations, each of which controls half-a-dozen or more plants, the transportation lines necessary to carry the product, the ore quarries, and the fuel-mines.

The wonderful development of the steel industry in the United States is due to the use of labor-saving machinery, and to the superb organization. The wages paid for labor are higher than those paid in European steel-making centres; the cost of living is not materially greater. The price of steel rails, which in 1880 was forty-eight dollars per ton, in 1900 was about twenty dollars per ton.

_Pittsburg_, together with _Homestead_, _Carnegie_, _McKeesport_, _Duquesne_, and _Braddock_, is the chief steel-making centre of the Ohio River Valley. There are also large plants at _New Castle_, _Sharon_, _Scranton_, _Johnstown_, _Bellaire_, _Youngstown_, _Mingo Junction_, and _Wheeling_. The steel-plant and rolling-mills at _South Bethlehem_ are designed especially for the manufacture of the heavy ordnance used in the army and navy. Nearly all the cities and towns of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and eastern Ohio carry on manufacturing enterprises that depend on coal mining and steel manufacture. The great and diversified manufactures of Philadelphia are due to its fortunate situation at tide-water, near the coal-mines. Cheap fuel and water transportation have made it one of the great industrial centres of the world.

The anthracite coal of this region is used wholly for fuel and steam-making; it is shipped partly by water from Philadelphia, but mainly in specially constructed cars to the various points of consumption. The soft coal is used also for fuel and steam-making, but a large part of the product is converted into c.o.ke and used in the steel-plants.

The petroleum of this region is a leading export of the country, the states of western Europe being the chief purchasers. Of agricultural products, hay, dairy products, and tobacco are the only ones of importance. Natural gas is used both as a fuel and in manufactures.

The lake-sh.o.r.e centre of steel manufacture depends largely on the low cost of transporting the iron ore, which in part is offset by the increased cost of coal. The low cost of shipping the manufactured product over nearly level trunk lines is a very substantial gain. _South Chicago_, _Toledo_, _Sandusky_, _Lorain_, _Cleveland_, _Ashtabula_, _Conneaut_, _Erie_, and _Buffalo_ are centres of steel manufacture or ore shipment, because they are situated on this great trade-route or line of least resistance.

The coal-mines and iron-making plants of the southern Appalachians have a considerable area. The chief manufacturing centres are _Birmingham_, _Richmond_, _Roanoke_, and _Chattanooga_. A considerable part of the Virginia ores find their way to the Ohio River steel-mills. Open-hearth steel is an important manufacture in Birmingham. A large part of the ores smelted in the southern Appalachian region are made into foundry iron.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

What are the advantages and the disadvantages of manufacturing cotton textiles in the New England States?

Why have the mining of ore and the manufacture of steel become generally unprofitable in the New England States?

What causes have brought about the lowering of the prices of cotton textiles during the past fifty years?--of shoes?

What makes the manufacture of artificial ice a precarious business north of the lat.i.tude of Philadelphia?

What are the advantages and the disadvantages arising from the location of a manufacturing industry at a seaport?

What is the design of a protective tariff? What are its advantages and disadvantages?

Why are most of the great steel-making plants so remote from the mines of iron ore used in making steel?

FOR COLLATERAL READING

Industrial Evolution of the United States--Chapters III-V.