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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (June 1, 1884)
THE WEST SHOBE. 166 ducod 40,000 codar Bhingles por day in 1883, which will be greatly incroasod the present year by the enlarged capacity of the mill. A bawmill recently erected on Lake Union, where much building is being done, and several others in various parts of the city, will make tho lumber product of the present year far exceed that of 1883. The fact that the immense product of tlieHO mills is used mainly in the construction of buildings in the city, shows to what a great extent building operations have been, and are, carried on there. There are other wood-working industries, some of them quite extensive, which contribute to the prosperity of tho city. Tho manufacture of furniture from the various kinds of hard and softwood growing about Puget Sound is an industry rapidly assuming large proportions. Tho Washington Furniture Company employed fifteen men in 1HS3 in the manufacture of furniture of all de scriptions. An enlargement of the capacity of the fac tory will increase its product the present year. Messrs. JJowell & Preston have a mill cutting 10,000 feet of hard wood lumber daily, and a largo chair factory, whose product readies tho home and San Francisco markets. Tlio Hall & Paulson Furniture Company has a mill cutting hardwood for a largo factory which is engaged in the manufacture of furniture of all descriptions. The pay roll of tho company carries about seventy-five men and amount to some H0O0 per month. Another branch of this industry is tho barrel factory of the Mattulalh Manufacturing Company, which covers alxmt fivo acres of ground, all of it enclosed and nearly all roofed over. During 1883 the company's pay roll averaged 125 names and $8,500 wages. There were pro duced 2,500 sugar barrok and 500 beef or fish barrels daily. Tho bulk of this product was shipped to San Francisco, though alout 10,000 barrels per month were used at tho limo kilns on San Juan and adjacent islands. Tho company had on hand at tho beginning of the present year 10,000,000 foot of logs, chiofly cottonwood, of which tho majority of barrels are made. Machino shops and iron works have become quite an extensive industry in Seattle. There are several estab lish.nent which employ a largo number of men and produce many thousands of dollars worth of machinery and other forms of manufactured iron. The Washington Iron orks employed fifty men in 1883, and melted 1,000 tonso mm. Iho machine shops attached to the foundry turmsl out three mill engines, eight steamboat engines and one loggmg locomotive, Wsides doing tt great ouan of general and miscellaneous ron orks gave employment to twenty-wx men in their foundry and machine shops i 1883, and tur70 egh UrR. engm several logging CAr8) . M stoves, fif oen hop furnaces and a largo amoun of cVZ work. The Industrial Iron Works employ five men and make n spenalty of ,nRiuo. J Shops have ten men tho pay roll nn,i ;vo f , lno The establishments enumerate h ow-muoonl3-all the Industrie, of the Z Z 7 y. 1 nere large number of smaller factories of various kinds, whose total product is considerable, and which, in the aggregate, give employ ment to a great number of men. There is scarcely a branch of manufacturing which is at all adapted to the conditions and resources of the Puget Sound region which will not find Seattle a superior location. Tnto is what has drawn so many to the city, has so largely in. creased their number and product within the past two years, and will in the future induce other and more con-' siderable ones to establish themselves. The business men have always conducted themselves in a liberal and public-spirited manner. Instead of holding out induce, ments to capital for the purpose of making all they can out of the new-comer, they recognize the fact that the welfare of the city requires them to aid and encourage new enterprises to make a successful beginning and be. come firmly established. This is one of the secrets of the continued prosperity of Seattle, regardless of the condition of surrounding cities. There is an industry which is at present unrepre sented, but which, when a railroad across the Cascades is constructed, will surely become an important one, and that is the manufacture of flour. With an abundance of coal mined in proximity to the city, and the harbor full of vessels of the grain fleet, great milling interests must inevitably spring up. The shipments of grain and flour at this point must assume great proportion Shipbuilding is an industry for which Seattle is peculiarly adapted. Its frontage of deep water, unruffled by tempests, its abundance of all the materials of wood, iron and coal, the unrivaled spars and masts which the adjacent forests will supply, all combine to render this unexcelled for the advantages it offers to shipbuilders. There has never been an extensive shipyard on the Sound, though at Seattle quite a number of vessels, chiefly schooners and steamboats for local traffic and the lumber trade, have been constructed. The following table gives the status of this industry on Puget Sound during the past four years, the greater number being built at Seattle: yar. Bteameri. yiS. ron' Va,ut' 1880 I j 2,184.88 $220,800 1881 7 12 8,502.08 WW 1882.,. , 4 7 8,888.82 290,000 1888 18 12 8,M8.CO 417.000 Two beautiful fresh water lakes, lying north and west, towards which the city is rapidly spreading, are destined to play an important part in the shipbuilding industry. A bill is before Congress granting the right of way for i canal to connect these two lakes with the Sound. This canal will undoubtedly be constructed, and will be fol lowed by the location of an immense shipyard and dry dock on Lake Washington. There is not in the world a place possessing greater advantages for a naval yard, nor one so easily defended, and before many years this fact will be so thoroughly impressed upon Congress that shipyard will be located there. Without waiting for this, however, private enterprise will make of this the greatest shipbuilding point on the Pacific Coast The mind naturally gravitates from the question of the construction of vessels to the use of them, and here,