The present time may be called a commercial .ra in the flour-milling industry. The period Tom 1870 to 1900 might fittingly be termed the nechanical era, for during that time greater :hanges and improvements were made in the irocess than in all the 200 years preceding it. During the mechanical period, there was also he export era, when the building of new mills ind the increasing output of old ones, together with the increase in wheat raising of the tountry, caused an over-production of flour, if lomestic markets alone were depended upon. n fact, the increased output was to keep pace vith the growing export trade. After review ng the natural development of the milling in lustry, which up to 1870 was identical with the trowth of the country, these three divisions,— he mechanical, the export and the commercial. — seem most important. Of the mechanical teriod it may be said that from its introduction n 1787, the milling system invented by Oliver ''.'vans dominated the milling industry until about 1870. The millstones were set close together, ;o as to secure as much flour as possible with 3ne grinding. There was a great deal of fric tion, and the resultant heat often brought about :heroical changes which injured the color and taste of the flour and lowered its grade. This process, well adapted to the soft, starchy corn position of winter wheat, was unsuccessful with the hard spring wheat rich in gluten, produc ing from the latter a dark-hued flour which brought a low price in the market. For this reason also spring wheat commanded a corn. paratively low price. In 1868 efforts began to remedy this condition by the invention of a middlings purifier, and this was successful in clearing the color and thus raising the market grade of spring wheat flour, and consequently of the grain from which it was made. At this stage of development interest was centered upon the Hungarian "higlinnlling° or gradual roller process of flour milling, and a delegation of American millers went to Europe to inspect that system. Its superiority was immediately recognized, and with several important and in genious modifications the process was adopted by all the larger merchant mills of the country. The former millstones were replaced by chilled iron or porcelain rolls, and the gradual crack ing, breaking and crushing of the grain was arranged to produce as large an amount of middlings as possible, where the old made every effort to avoid them. For it had been found that out of the middlings came the high-grade "patent" flour with its large and valuable content of gluten. The roller mill was invented in the United States by John Stevens of Neenah, VVis., about 1870, but patents were not awarded to him until 1880. The merchant mills of the country generally acknowledged his rights by paying for the use of his inventions long after they were installed. In the roller mills of the present day there are five redactions of the grain and six separa tions of the middlings before the actual grind ing into flour. The product consists of 61.5 per cent of flour; 9.2 per cent of baker's flour; 3.7 per cent of glow grade" flour; 2.4 per cent of "red doe; and 23.5 per cent of "offal;' which includes the bran and shorts.
Like the development of milling in this country, the export flour business was not placed upon a high commercial .basis until the Minneapolis millers, in the early eighties, be gan a systematic campaign. From that time until 1900, the export trade increased steadily. Since then some adverse factors have arisen. The early mills of the Atlantic coast, as al ready mentioned, were the first to export flour, probably to meet an actual demand because these mills were the most convenient to buy from, rather than to supply a trade that had been built up by the mills. The early export business doubtless came of itself —a natural demand. The uncertain export flour trade of the first part of the last century reached its climax in the 40's, and then, when competi tion of European mills was felt, dropped off markedly, about the year 1850. During the next 25 years large amounts of wheat were exported annually, while the percentage of the flour pro duction that was sent out of the country was small. The flour trade with the United King
dom which is now an important part of the export flour business of this country, fell al most entirely away by 1865. This, perhaps, was because the American millers could not hold their own on even terms against the foreign millers, who were then becoming more pro gressive than ever before. The building up of the export flour trade, beginning with about 1875, makes an interesting chapter of com mercial history.
The statistics of the flour milling industry in the United States, gathered by the census of manufactures for 1914, include only those mills which do merchant grinding as distin guished from those which do strictly custom work. Some mills which do both are included in the reports. The decrease of the number of establishments in the milling industry since the 1909 census is due partly to the general depres sion existing in 1914, and in part to the fact that a number of grain elevators discontinued their former milling work. Besides these rea sons, another appears in the fact that several mills which had been doing both custom and merchant grinding discontinued the latter busi ness, and thus dropped out of the census tabu lation.
As reported, the number of establishments engaged in merchant milling in the United States in 1914 was 10,788 (11,691 in 1909). The number of persons engaged in the indus try was 65,635 (66,054 in 1909), of whom 39,718 (39,453• in 1909) were wage-earners, receiving $24,593,162 annually in wages ($21,464,386 in 1909). The capital employed was $380,257,420 ($349,151,779 in 1909). The amount of grain ground was 818,929,321 bushels (806,247,961 bushels in 1909), and the value of the product was $877,679,709 ($883,584,405 in 1909). The cost of materials was $752,270,021 ($767,576, 479 in 1909), the value added by manufacture being $125,409,688 ($116,007,926 in 1909). An additional output properly to be credited to the milling industry is that of 40 establishments engaged primarily in other industries but which manufactured gristmill products valued at $9, 046,499. A large quantity of grain was used also by establishments whose products are known as °breakfast foods," but which the census classifies as °Food Preparations." Be sides these, the manufacturers of starch and glucose ground about 44,000,000 bushels of corn.
Of the total quantity of grain ground by the milling industry proper in 1914, 545,728,431 bushels were wheat; 180,115,704 bushels were corn; 50,227,050 bushels were oats; 20,288,396 bushels were barley; 12,813,831 bushels were rye; 5,478,045 bushels were buckwheat; and 4,277, 864 bushels were of other grains. The produc tion of wheat flour totaled 116,403,770 barrels, valued at $543,839,508 — showing an increase of 11.9 per cent in production over the 1909 figures, but a decrease in value of 1.1 per cent. The figures include 573,979 barrels of graham flour. Of rye flour and rye graham, 1,937,385 barrels were made; in value, $7,845,213 — an increase of 25.8 per cent since 1909. Of corn meal and corn flour, the production was 16,327,993 barrels, valued at $54,963,301 — a falling off of 242 per cent from the production of 1909. The produc tion of buckwheat flour amounted to 125,622, 189 pounds (value, $3,754,857); and of barley meal, 14,000,789 pounds (value, $242,343)— a de crease of 28.7 per cent in the former and of 51 per cent in the latter from the respective pro ductions of 1909. In connection with the other flouring-mill products there were reported the manufacture of 870,364,453 pounds of hominy and grits (value $13,767,561); and 30,451,581 pounds of oatmeal (value $757,804); and 92, 676,085 pounds of various cereal °breakfast valued at $2,932,238. Miscellaneous cereal products totaled a value of $2,091,922. As by-products the flour mills produced 4,666. 534 tons of bran and middlings valued at $104, 702,735, and 4,753,280 tons of feed and offal valued at $137,067,959; besides 301,949 gallons of corn oil, worth $152,208, and "other mill products') valued at $5,562,000.