History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

734
AGRICULTURE AND MANUFACTURES.
little profit for the manufacturer. Pine barks are used
to a small extent, but chestnut, oak, hemlock, and
sumac are not found in Utah. Nevertheless there
were in 1883 about 25 tanneries in operation, producing
leather valued at $250,000. During this year
some 200 car-loads of hides and pelts were shipped to
the eastern states, sufficient to supply almost the entire
demand of Utah for leathern products. The
leather used for harness and saddlery, trunks and
valises, of which the manufacture amounts to not less
than $150,000, is almost entirely imported. The
same condition of affairs exists among the furniture
and carriage and wagon factories, which import nearly
all of their material, paying for it the same rates of
freight as on imported vehicles and furniture, while
labor is considerably higher than in the eastern states. 45
Under such disadvantages, it was greatly to the
credit of the settlers that they undertook to compete
to any considerable extent with eastern manufacturers,
and that the production of goods should
increase steadily from year to year, with occasional
set-backs caused by dull markets and over-production.
Manufacturing is seldom a profitable industry in new
countries, even from materials native to them, and
under the most favorable conditions. It is doubtful
whether this branch of enterprise, throughout the
Pacific slope, yielded, on an average, six per cent on
the entire capital invested, and it is doubtful whether
even this average was obtained in Utah.
The production of iron—not only of pig-iron, but of
iron and steel rails—and of mill, mining, smelting,
and railroad machinery, bids fair in 1886 to be foremost
45 Nevertheless James B. Glass, who opened a carriage manufactory and
repository at S. L. City in 1879, reports that between that date and 1884 his
sales increased eightfold. For further general mention of Utah manufactures,
see Hollister's Res. and Attract, of Utah (1882), 55-6; Gov. Message, 1S82, pp.
7-8; 8. L. Wkly Herald, Nov. 17, 1881; Dy Telegraph, Dec. 1, 1868; Tribune,
May 3, 24, 1873; Sloan's Utah, 7, 13-14; Utah Gazetteer, 1S84, 50, 299.
In March 1882, $5,000 was appropriated by the legislature as a premium to
be paid to the producer of 7,000 lbs of merchantable brown sugar, made in
Utah from material produced in the country. Utah Laws, 1882, 44-5.