SIFTY

BY

years ago the Northwest, including what is now Minnesota, western Wisconsin, North and South Dakota and Montana, was a wilderness of prairie and forest inhabited chiefly by a few bands of roving Indians. White settlers had only begun to creep in along the eastern edge of this vast territory. But settlement once begun progressed rapidly. Immigrants poured in and soon spread over the eastern portion of the region.

Lumbering was at first the principal industry. Millions of acres of timber covering a large part of Minnesota and Wisconsin made this inevitable. As the population increased and the pioneers began breaking up the broad prairie lands and cutting down the forests, agriculture became prominent. The rich soil and invigorating climate were found to

be peculiarly adapted to the raising of wheat, and before many years had passed the Northwest became the great wheat belt of the United States. Other fruits of the soil were not neglected and the quantity and variety of the products increased until almost enough was raised by northwestern farmers to feed the nation.

For such a vast, rich producing territory there must be a great central marketing and distributing point. The natural location for this commercial center was at the head of navigation on the continent's greatest river, the Mississippi, where there was abundant water power for manufacturing purposes furnished by the mighty stream itself. There two prosperous cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul, have grown up, side by side.

Situated on the west bank of the river and possessing the advantage of the immense water power supplied by St. Anthony Falls, Minneapolis has outstripped her sister city and has become the great

Originally Minneapolis was purely a milling town. The early settlers were quick to appreciate and utilize the wonderful power furnished by the waters of the Mississippi in their seventy-foot plunge. To the north stretched vast forests, with innumerable connecting lakes and intersecting streams forming a natural waterway down which felled timber could easily be floated to the Minneapolis mills. Soon the city became a great lumbering center with sawmills lining both banks of the river. With the destruction of the forests of northern Minnesota and Wisconsin the sawmill industry has declined rapidly and many of the great mills are now silent, but the city continues to be the greatest lumber distributing point in the world.

Long before its passing, the sawmill had yielded first place in importance to the flourmill. Lying in the midst of the world's greatest wheat field and with

and a capacity of twenty-five million. Minneapolis flour is world renowned for its excellence. It has carried the city's name into every known corner of the globe and made it famous.

The mills have also been the chief factor in making the city the greatest of primary wheat markets. From all over the rich northwest farming region a continual stream of golden grain pours into Minneapolis. On every side the city's skyline is broken by huge elevators built for the receipt and storage of grain and having a total capacity of forty million bushels. On an average more than ninety million bushels of wheat are received in the city each year, while the amount of other grains shipped in is about fifty million bushels. Minneapolis also holds preeminence in the Northwest as a fruit and produce market.

With the milling industry as a nucleus, other important industries have devel

splendid facilities for grinding the cereal, Minneapolis soon developed her flourmanufacturing industry to immense proportions. The city now has twenty-two great flourmills, which have an average annual output of sixteen million barrels

oped until the city is now the manufacturing center of the Northwest. There are nearly nine hundred factories of various kinds within the corporate limits. The value of their annual product is estimated at $140,000. Thirty thousand men

$52,000,000 and those in the savings banks and trust companies $22,000,000. For the first eleven months of 1907 the clearing-house figures exceeded $1,000,000,000. The sound condition of the city's financial institutions was exhibited in a marked degree during the recent money stringency. Minneapolis was one of the very few cities in the United States which was not obliged to resort to the use of clearing-house certificates or cashier's checks in lieu of cash. So far as Minneapolis was concerned there need have been no financial stringency. Because banks in New York and Chicago suspended cash payments, Minneapolis banks which had