mills and animals were used to produce power. The manufacture of electrical apparatus has become an immense industry, and in making agricultural machines and tools the United States excels every other country. The hand-trades and the local industries annually produce over $1,200,000,000 of goods. The manufactures of the United States equal those of France, Germany and the United Kingdom together. (See Furniture, Glass, Smelting and Steel; articles on other manufactures; and the subject of Manufactures in articles on states.)
Agriculture. Fore more than a century the United States has been the greatest agricultural country on the globe. The American farmer in two years produces more wealth than have all the gold-mines of the entire world since 1492. The immense extent of fertile land, the liberal policy of the national government as to the public domain (see Homestead Laws and Preëmption), the climatic advantages and the comparative ease of access are among the causes that brought about this preëminence. In the continental United States, excluding Alaska and the islands, there remained 327,489,968 acres of public lands on July 1, 1911, still available for settlement. Most of this, however, is in mountainous and arid regions. In 1910 the farms were worth $28,475,674,169. The size of an average farm is about 138 acres. Agriculture employs nearly 11,000,000 people, almost half of all laborers in the United States, and almost 5,000,000 families live on farms. The chief agricultural areas are the central plain from the Appalachians to 100° W.; the Gulf states and Georgia; and the Pacific slope. But the Atlantic slope also abounds in valuable farms on its fertile lowlands; and the soil of the arid regions along the Rockies—regions comprising nearly a third of the United States—is generally fertile and only needs irrigation (q. v.). New York and New England chiefly engage in mixed farming and in dairying; the Mississippi valley grows the cereals; the south cotton, sugar, tobacco and tropical fruits, besides truck-farming for northern markets; and the Pacific coast grain and fruits. The agricultural products of the United States form the bulk of the exports.
Cereals are the most important farm-product, and corn (q. v.) leads in the amount grown. In 1910 the yields were 3,125,713,000 bushels of corn; 1,126,765,000 of oats; 695,443,000 of wheat; 162,227,000 of barley; 33,039,000 of rye (some European countries far surpassing the United States as producers of rye); 24,510,000 of rice; and 17,239,000 of buckwheat. (See articles under these titles.) In 1910 the corn of the United States was worth $1,523,713,000; the wheat $621,443,000; the oats $384,716,000; the barley $93,785,000; the rye $23,840,000; and the buckwheat $11,231,000. All cereals in that year totaled 5,140,896,000 bushels and were valued at $2,710,000,000.
Cotton (q. v.) stands next to corn as a commercial asset of the United States. It is the chief product of the south, and in 1909 it was worth $703,619,303. The cotton states from first to last in production that year were Texas, Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Tennessee, Florida, Missouri, Virginia and Kentucky.
The humble hay-crop, however, has sometimes been worth even more than cotton, though lacking its commercial and industrial importance, for in 1910 it weighed 60,978,000 tons and was valued at $747,769,000.
Potatoes (Irish and sweet) were valued at ($187,985,000), Wisconsin, Minnesota and New York raising Irish potatoes in large quantities, and southern Illinois and the south the sweet potato. See Potato.
Fruit-raising, taken in the widest sense, is a great branch of American agriculture. In Delaware, Florida, New Jersey, southern California, western New York and western Michigan it is the leading industry of the farm. In the mountainous regions of Montana, in Oregon and in Washington it also is a great industry. Oranges and pineapples are the chief fruits of Florida; almonds, apricots, grapes, lemons, oranges and prunes of the greatest importance in California; grapes in New York and Ohio; apples in New York and New England; peaches in Michigan and Georgia. Small fruits, as blackberries, gooseberries, raspberries and strawberries, are grown almost everywhere. Over half a billion bushels of apples, apricots, grapes, peaches, pears, prunes and small fruits are raised, apples being largely exported, and the value of the fruit crops, nuts and orchard products some years reaching $140,000,000. (See Fruit and articles under titles as above.)
Tobacco (q. v.) is another of the great crops. In 1910 it was raised on 1,233,800 acres to the amount of 894,349,000 pounds valued at $91,458,773. For rice and sugar see articles under these titles. In 1910-11 the output of cane-sugar was 311,000 tons; beet-sugar 455,000 tons, the sugar-beet being cultivated in many of the states with temperate climates. Considerable flax is grown, chiefly for seed, in Minnesota, Wisconsin and some other states of the north, the yield in 1909 being 25,856,000 bushels.
Stock raising (including poultry farming) and dairying are other great branches of American agriculture. In 1909 the dairy factories used 9,888,727,303 pounds of milk and 1,406,143,908 pounds of cream, and made 624,764,653 pounds of butter; 311,126,317 of cheese, and 494,796,544 of condensed milk, the value of the three being $274,557,718. New York, Wisconsin and
