Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 August 1892 — OUR CORN ABROAD. [ARTICLE]

OUR CORN ABROAD.

THE SUCCESS OF TIIE AMERICAN MAIZE MISSIONARY. \ 1 Great Increase In the Exportation of Corn—“ Murphy Brod” lu Germany and Franco. The department of agriculture has issued an exhibit which cannot but be of exceeding interest throughout the country, being nothing less than a triumphant demonstration of the splendid success attained by the American corn missionary, Mr. Charles J. Murphy,in his work of popularizing maize as an article of food in Europe. A very practical evidence of what ho has achieved is the report of Mr. Walter E. Gardner, American consul at Rotterdam, Netherlands, to the effect that while during the first three months of 1801 the total importation of American corn art that port was only 07,738 bushels, the quantity brought in during a corresponding period of the present year was 0,308,000 bushels, most of which was transshipped to Germany. But the most striking and significant bit of evidence seut out with the department’s report is a red poster, one of those now employed for the decoration of Berlin and the information of the hungry masses of Deutschland. It is only two feet long by eighteen inches wide; but that is big in tho old world, where the economy iu use of paper is such that even theatrical show bills and circus ]M)sters are customarily of modest size. At its head the American eagle is depicted in the act of screaming. Then 'ollows in largo letters;

MURPHY BROD (2-3 Roggeu, 1-8 Mais) 5 Pfund 00 Pfennige. Fruhcrer Preis fur 8 Pfund 50 Pf. Succeeding are announcements of G. Muller’s big bakery, with its four branches, in Berlin, at which tho “Murphy brod” is obtainable. Putting into plain English the facts llerr Muller thus presents to his countrymen, ho offers for sixty pfennige (about fifteen cents) a quantity of bread, composed of twothirds rye und one-third corn flour, for which, at the rate charged previously for rye bread, 8 i pfennige (nearly twenty-one cents), would have been demanded. A reduction of a little over a cfent on each pound of broad ho consumes means a great deal to the Gorman workingman, particularly whon ho learns, us ho Rpocdfly will, that tho new and cheaper bread is more palatable swid nutritious than that to which ho has been accustomed. In Hamburg an American firm have gone into the business of supplying “Murphy brod" to the public, and their success has spread dismay among the conservative bakers who have antagonized the new flour. Wherever the indefatigable endeavors of Mr. Murphy have enabled the public to test atm prove the virtues of Indian corn lively appreciation of its desirabilty as a food has been demonstrated, and it is no longer admissible of question that through his enthusiastic efforts—primarily, simply, as u private individual, “because ho was that, sort of a crank,” and luter as an accredited ugcut of our Government—a wonderful impetus has been given to the world’s demand for one of our chief products. It is a fact not generally known that we devote an acreage to corn growing exceeding the aggregate urea devoted to all otlier corials and potatoes, double that cut for hay, and greater than all upon which wheat, oats and cotton are cultivated. Even in the eleven cotton growing states a larger area of cultivated land is devoted to corn and to cotton. Tho acreage now planted in corn annually, ocpbrding to the statistics of the department of agriculture, “is greater than the total surface area of New England, New York and New Jersey combined; greater than the whole arcu ol the United Kingdom or of Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, Denmark, Portugal and Greece combined. It more than equals in extent the total cultivated land in Franca or Germany or Austria-Hungary, and is three-fourths os largo as the aggregate acreage sown to wheat in all the countries of Europe together.” About 90 per cent, of this enormous production is annuully consumed in the country, more than 80 per cent, never crosses the lines of the country where it Is grown, and not only is it a leading staple for the food of man and beast, but on the broad prairies of the West where wood is scarce vast quantities of ft have been consumed as fuel. Our production of corn since 1808 has averaged 1,455,998,094 bushels per annum, and Dur average exportation has been only f«8 per cent, up to the present year. Not only in quantity but in quality does ur corn lead the world. Inferior maize of unpalatable sorts is grown in Italy, Spain and parts of France, and there is also Ilanubian corn, (it only for chicken feed, but the United States monopolizes the supply of this cereal fit for fiuman consumption. Hungary, Russia, India and the Argentine Republic may compete with our wheat crop, but American corn has practically no rivals. Hence nothin be of much greater importance in Ihe line of developing the value of our resources than such work as Mr. Murphy has been doing. In the language of Secretary Rusk, “ Could we jeeure an advance of even five cents a bushel on an average for corn during the ensuing decade, which might well be done and still enable us to supply the foreign demand at a price far below that of other cereal foods of equal value, the result would be to add $1,000,000,000 to the value of this crop during that period.”