No Grain Elevators In California

Categories: Grains and Forage Crops

Is California wheat shipped in bulk or in bags at the present time?



There are no elevators in this State, owing to the fact that hitherto

grain cargoes have been acceptable to ship only as sacked grain, because

of claimed danger of shifting cargo and disaster during the long voyage

around the Horn. A novel by Frank Norris, entitled the "Octopus,"

describes a man being killed by smothering in a grain elevator at Port

Costa, but there never was an elevator at that point, and consequently

there never was a man killed by getting under the spout thereof.

Answering specifically your question, California grain is shipped in

bags and not in bulk. It is handled in sacks from the separator to

roadside or riverside storage, to the loading point into the ships and

out of the ships on the other side - still in bags.