Page:EB1922 - Volume 31.djvu/839

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LOUIS—LOUISIANA
799

was nearly $19,000,000; the enrolment 115,530, and the teaching force 5,147. The university of California organized in Los Angeles a southern branch, providing a two-year course. The public library in 1920 contained 383,925 volumes with a home circulation of 2,581,214, and there were 12 branches, 24 sub-branches, and 139 depositories with 14,792 volumes.

Industries and Commerce. In 1914 Los Angeles was the twenty- sixth city in the United States in value of manufactured products; in Jan. 1921 an estimate showed it to be tenth. In 1912 the value of the manufactured products was $85,000,000. In 1919 according to an estimate of the Los Angeles chamber of commerce there were 3,300 establishments representing an investment of $400,000,000 and producing a product valued at $618,772,500. The chief in- dustries with the value of their products were motion-picture films, $150,000,000, 80% of the world's supply; petroleum refining, $83,- 000,000; shipbuilding, $68,000,000; meat-packing, $42,000,000; food products, $41,000,000; garment manufacture, $30,000,000; iron and steel, $25,000,000; automobiles and accessories, $21,000,000; and railway car construction, $20,000,000. In 1919 Southern California produced 102,000,000 bar. of crude oil, Los Angeles being the centre for this industry. In 1914 there were 2,100 oil wells in the city. Bank clearings increased from $942,914,424 in 1911 to $3,994,280,- 518.83 for 1920. The post-office receipts during the same period increased from $1,646,601.84 in 1911 to $4,180,057.70 for 1920. The assessed valuation of property of Los Angeles in 1920 on a 50% basis was $636,147,965. The most important event in the economic development of Los Angeles was the building of the municipal aqueduct, placed in operation Nov. 5 1913. It is capable of furnish- ing water to over a million population and a surplus to irrigate 135,000 ac., and also sufficient for all demands of industry. The fall in the aqueduct is used to develop electric power. In 1917 a plant of 37. 5 H.P., and in 1919 one of 28,000 H.P. was thus supplied. In the decade 1910-20 Los Angeles developed from a port of relative unimportance to one of the leading ports on the Pacific coast, though the immediate increase in shipping and industry which the city expected as a result of the completion of the Panama Canal did not materialize. This was partly due to the unusual conditions arising from the World War. Since 1918 the city's commerce has increased remarkably. The value of its foreign exports in 1912 was $235,460, in 1919 $10,496,172, and in 1920 $18,606,121, the latter an increase of 80% over 1919. The imports in 1912 were $1,710,127, in 1919 $3,218,490 and in 1920 $9,724,217, the latter an increase of 206% over 1919. (R. A. V.)

LOUIS [LUDWIG], Ex-King of Bavaria. (1845-1921), assumed the regency in succession to his father on Dec. 12 1912. In accordance with the bill passed by the Bavarian Diet he assumed the crown on Nov. 5 1913 (King Otto, who had been kept in confinement as a lunatic, died on Oct. n 1916). On the after- noon of Nov. 7 1918, the King was taking a walk with his daugh- ters in the Englischer Garte-n, unconscious of the fact that the Socialist demonstration organized by Eisner on the Theresien- wiese was developing into a revolution. A plain man of the people met the King and said to him: " Get home as quickly as you can, your Majesty, things are not going well." Later in the evening the monarch was informed by his ministers that the republic had been proclaimed. With the Queen and his daughters the King promptly left Munich in one of his motor-cars, the whole luggage consisting of a few handbags. The royal family resided first at Berchtesgaden, and afterwards at a castle assigned to them on the shores of the Chiem See. On Nov. 13 he formally signed his abdication, and relieved all Bavarian officials, officers and soldiers from their oath of allegiance. He died at Sarvar, Hungary, Oct. 17 1921.

LOUISIANA (see 17.53). The pop. of the state in 1920 was 1,798,509 as compared with 1,656,388 in 1910, an increase of 142,121, or 8-3 % for the decade. During 1910-20 negroes decreased from 713,874 to 700,257, or from 43-1% of the total pop. to 38-9%. The percentage of urban pop. increased from 30-0 in 1910 to 34-9 in 1920. Owing to the size of its principal city, New Orleans, Louisiana had a larger percentage of urban pop. than any other Southern state, except Florida.

The* cities having a pop. of over 10,000 in 1920 and their percentage of increase were as follows:

1920

1910

Increase per cent.

17,510

11,21 5

56-2

Baton Rouge .... Lake Charles .... Monroe

21,782 13,088 12,675 387,219

14,897

11,449 10,209 -110,07=;

46-2

14-3 24-2

I4.-2

Shreveport

43.874

28,015

56-6

Agriculture. The most important industry of the state has always been agriculture. The total value of all farm crops in 1919 as reported by the Bureau of the Census was $206,182,548 as compared with $73,536,538 reported by the same bureau in 1909. The total number of farms in 1920 was 135,463, representing a gain of 14,917 during the preceding decade. Cotton, sugar-cane, corn, rice, hay and forage in the order named constitute the most important field crops. The advent of the boll weevil in the state in 1908 resulted in a sharp decline in the production of cotton and in the introduction of more diversified farming in the parishes where cotton had con- stituted the principal crop. The effect of this pest on cotton produc- tion is shown by the decline in the yield from 675,000 bales in 1908 to 246,000 bales two years later. By 1917, however, with improved methods of production and the stimulus of high prices, the output had increased to 639,000 bales, to fall again in 1918 to 588,000, and in 1919 to 307,000. With the development of diversified farming the yield of maize (Indian corn) steadily increased, being 28,800,000 bus. in 1918 and 21,676,000 in 1919. The live-stock industry also gained in importance. The production of rice in 1919 was 16,011,000 bus., with a farm value of $42,751,000. Practically all the cane sugar produced in the United States came from Louisiana. The trucking industry has attained considerable importance in the vicinity of New Orleans, and the raising of strawberries has proved profitable and is being steadily extended in the cut-over pine lands of Livings- ton and Tangipahoa parishes. Citrus fruits are grown in considerable quantity along the Mississippi river below New Orleans.

Manufactures. The production of lumber is the leading manu- facturing industry of the state. In 1914 the lumber and timber products had a value of $66,656,268, Louisiana ranking second among the states. The manufacture of sugar, including refining and the production of molasses, came second with total products valued at $57,948,322. There was a considerable variation in the output of cane sugar, as the following figures in short tons indicate: 1915,

  • 37,5; 1916, 303,900; 1917,243,600; 1918, 280,900; 1919, 115,590;

1930, 169,126. The production of cotton-seed oil and cake and the cleaning and polishing of rice occupied third and fourth places in the state's manufactures, with products valued in 1914 at $18,- 106,257 and $12,966,690 respectively. The refining of petroleum has attained increasing importance in recent years.

Minerals. Louisiana leads all other states in the production of sulphur, and in 1917 was third in the production of rock salt. Both the sulphur and rock-salt deposits lie in the southern portion of the state and yield a product of unusual purity. The south-eastern limit of the mid-continental petroleum field lies in the north-western section of the state, in the parishes of Caddo, Red River, De Soto and Claiborne. The Gulf Coast oil-field reaches into the state from the S.W., and is most productive in the vicinity of Vinton, Jennings and Anse La Butte. The state's output in 1920 was 35,649,000 bar. ; in 1918, 15,423,520. In 1920 the live stock on farms was valued by the Department of Agriculture at $120,000,000 as compared with $43,315,000 in 1910.

Administration. On March I 1921 a constitutional convention assembled at Baton Rouge to draft a new constitution which, on its adoption, would become the tenth under which the state has been governed since its admission to the Union in 1812, not including the constitution of the Confederate period, 1861-5. The constitution of 1913, the immediate predecessor of that of 1921, was not, strictly speaking, a new instrument, but was mainly a textual revision of the constitution of 1898 by the incorporation into the body of the document of some 6o-odd amendments which had been adopted in previous years and had become so numerous as to create confusion. Other than this change in form, the 1913 constitution included no new material except provisions for refunding the state debt, due Jan. I 1914, and for the prevention of combinations in restraint of trade. Owing to the many restrictions of a statutory nature included in the constitution of 1898, it was found necessary to submit a large number of amendments to the voters after nearly every biennial session of the Legislature. This defect was not avoided in the con- stitution of 1913. Consequently in Nov. 1916 18 constitutional amendments were submitted to the voters, and 17 were adopted. In Nov. 1918 14 more were submitted, and 13 were adopted. This constant addition of amendments proved both costly and confusing, and was one of the chief factors in bringing about the movement for the adoption of a new constitution in 1921.

Education. Material improvement in the provision for the educational institutions of the state was effected in 1918 and 1920. In the former year five constitutional amendments were adopted which resulted in more than doubling the state and local revenues for the support of the public schools'. A special tax was also provided for the support of the institutions for higher education. In 1920 a special tax of 2 % on the value of all natural products from the land oil, natural gas, sulphur, salt and lumber was imposed to create a fund for the maintenance of the state institutions, and the proceeds of this tax were appropriated the following year for the physical equipment of the College of Agriculture, which is one department of the Louisiana State University. In 1916 the system of compulsory education according to the option of each parish gave way to a state-wide compulsory education law requiring a minimum attend- ance of 140 days at school in each school vear by all children between the ages of 7 and 14 years. There has been difficulty, however, in