actual figures of the Monroe station in Monroe, for one month in 1911! This appears to be an astounding statement-yet fully verified. Through the courtesy of the agents of the railroads entering Monroe we have obtained tabulated statements of the freight traffic, in this city during the year 1911, which offers in a concise form, information that will surprise a great many readers not previously familiar with the facts. The amount of freight, in pounds, shipped by the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad in 1911, from Monroe was 183,040,510; while there was received in the same time, 354,481,047 pounds. Of this incoming freight the largest item was coal, amounting 48,332,700 pounds; the next was in material used in the large paper mills, amounting 39,332,700 pounds; this does not include 9,240,425 pounds of pulp received for the same purpose from Canada. An analysis of the shipments by this road alone from Monroe during the period named, shows that the following concerns contributed each their full share: Boehme & Rauch Company, 34,744,751 pounds; Monroe Binder Board Company, 21,768,039 pounds; Amendt Milling Company, 21,024,005 pounds; R. R. Paper Company, 14,922,428 pounds; Monroe Canning Company, 732,500 pounds; WilderStrong Implement Company, 1,142,670 pounds; Monroe Furnace Company, 11,360,280 pounds. These are shipments by the Lake Shore & M. S. Railroad only.

The Michigan Central Railroad's statement, by months, follows:

The Detroit and Toledo, Shore Line, a branch of the Grand Trunk Railway System, have fallen below the other lines somewhat, and furnish us only approximate figures for the business of 1911, as follows: Freight shipments from Monroe, 66,175,000; freight receipts at Monroe, 26,140,000.

The Pere Marquette Railroad's figures are as follows: Shipments 20,275,000; receipts, 18,170,000.

There are seventy-eight freight and passenger trains arriving and departing every twenty-four hours on the steam lines from the stations in Monroe, not including extras and "specials.”

The Detroit United Railway interurban lines contribute a liberal amount of business to the total of transportation business of Monroe, running fifty cars daily between Monroe and Detroit and Monroe and Toledo, in addition to which are six package, freight and express cars. The latter carried during May, 1912, which is a fair monthly average for the year: Receipts, 571,804 lbs. shipments, 667,956 pounds-making a total for the year approximately 8,013,072 lbs. outgoing freight, and

6,861,648 lbs. incoming. This road has been in operation about twelve years, its first experimental run was on Christmas day, 1902, when the then general manager, A. F. Edwards, took a small party of friends. northward.

The electric line has cut deeply into the passenger business of the steam roads, although all of them have met the reduced rates in force on the former.

CHAPTER XXX

INDUSTRIES AND COMMERCE

START OF MONROE NURSERIES-FRENCHI PEARS AND APPLES—TREES PLANTED SOON AFTER WAR OF 1812-FIRST PERMANENT NURSERY BUSINESS-THE MUTUAL AND MICHIGAN NURSERIES-A MONROE WOMAN FOUNDS CANNING INDUSTRY-THE FISHING INDUSTRY-MONROE COUNTY FISHERIES-COMMERCIAL FISHING-FISHING NOT ALL PROFIT-WINTER SPORTS ON THE ICE-EXPORTATION OF CATTLE AND HOGS-FLOUR MILLS-THE AMENDT MILLING COMPANY-WATERLOO ROLLER MILLS-BOEHME & RAUCH COMPANY-WEIS MANUFACTURING COMPANY-MONROE BINDER BOARD COMPANY-RIVER RAISIN PAPER COMPANY-ELKHART MANUFACTURING COMPANY-MONROE GLASS COMPANY-MONROE WOOLEN MILL-MONROE FOUNDRY AND FURNACE

COMPANY.

Monroe has for half a century been noted for the vast extent, and absolute superiority of its nurseries. Its fame has not only penetrated every portion of our own country, but has spread into Europe, whereever horticulture at its best possesses interest. The poet sings the praise of him who causes "two blades of grass to grow where but one grew before❞—which is well; but how about him who causes a hundred thousand trees to spread their grateful shade and contribute their life-giving luscious fruits for the delectation of the human race? This is the function and the beneficence of the wise nursery man.

START OF MONROE NURSERIES

It had like many another great industry, its start in small beginnings. The thousand acres and more devoted to the propagation of fruit and ornamental trees in Monroe, in this sheltered environment of Lake Erie, and the climate immune to the violent disturbances and changes which is fatal to the perfect development of out-of-doors industries elsewhere, are the evolution of seventy years, intelligent and masterful effort to supplement nature's generous opportunities in the valley of the Rivière aux Raisins. This evolution has been magical in its results.

FRENCH PEARS AND APPLES

Are the pear and apple trees propagated from the seedlings brought to Monroe from sunny France by the pioneers, one hundred and twentyeight years ago, and from the banks of the St. Lawrence still bearing the same pleasant flavored fruit that they did in their youth? A few of the rugged survivors of those early planted orchards are still doing duty on the same premises! With not a human being still living, who saw them and ate of their fruit in their youth they are still alive and bearing. The claim of the actual superiority of that fruit over some of the modern varieties is no doubt largely based on sentiment.

The old pear trees of Monroe! They have been the theme of the historian, the poet, the romancer; they still, each year, put forth their welcome blossoms, and each succeeding harvest time, the fruits of their old age. From an article written for the Monroe Democrat, based on notes prepared some years ago, for a paper contributed to the Michigan Agricultural College material is gathered for some interesting facts in connection with this subject. It covers the period from 1784 to 1840, and from that time to the present.

The Francis Navarre farm, as well as the La Tour, Labadie, Roberts, LaSalle Caldwell, Mommonie and others along the River Raisin, boasted orchards of these fine trees of great size and height, rivalling the very forest giants. A limited number of these are still standing. The writer recently saw a row of some five or six, standing where they were first planted, in the city of Monroe. True, they bore the marks of their one hundred and twenty-five years of battling with storm and tempest, and appeared to have shrunken, like humans, and grown gray and shattered under the hand of time and to have parted with the luxuriant growth of foliage and the vigor of their long past youth, but were laden with the blossoms and the young fruit. One of this little group had lately been cut down to make way for the opening of a new street in the development of the manufacturing district, yielding to the inexorable demands of material progress, when it was found, upon examination that the concentric rings of the trunk numbered one hundred and twentyeight indicating the years of its life, and that it was among the first that had been planted in this part of the country by the original French settlers on the south bank of the River Raisin. Others, in the premises of the Dr. Sawyer residence, in the grounds of the late Dr. Harry Conant, in the Cole homestead, and others, while old residents pointed out the site of orchards of these highly esteemed, venerable trees.

Among the farms westward along the river they were many, also, pear and apple trees. Within a very few days Mr. George Wakefield has placed in the hands of the author several of small, spicy flavored apples from trees planted by the Indians and early French a century ago and which were upon the farm which he now owns in Raisinville. So far as the memory of any man now living can vouch, there has never been a season when these ancient trees have not borne fruit.

TREES PLANTED SOON AFTER WAR OF 1812

Among the trees planted soon after the war of 1812, upon the return of the refugees from Canada and the states of Ohio and Kentucky were those standing in the yards of T. E. Wing (the old Colonel Anderson place); of Judge Warner Wing; in the old Macomb Street House yard and elsewhere, many of the trunks of which measured eight feet and upwards in circumference, four feet from the ground.

Notable examples of this remarkable family of trees stood upon the farm of Stephen Downing, which were planted by him in 1813 or 1814. A singular circumstance is related in connection with these trees. They were at one time apparently dying from some undiscovered cause. Mr. Downing's people were during the summer in that year, in the habit of making ice cream underneath the shade of these trees and the salt and ice used in the process was thrown upon the ground about the roots of them. This continued for some weeks, with the effect of arresting the cause of the decay and causing the trees to take on a new lease of life, and ultimate complete restoration to health. Such remarkable longevity and such marvelous and continuous yields of fine and delicious. fruit seem to afford a warrant for the magnificent nurseries that flourish

in Monroe and to confirm the belief that there is something magical in the soil, the atmosphere and the climate which has from the earliest. days made the location an ideal one for the nurserymen.

As stated, the Monroe nurseries have, for a long time been widely known to every section of the United States, for their extent, not only, but for every characteristic that enriches the factors in a business the success of which perhaps, more than most others is based upon the confidence reposed in it by the public which it serves.

The virtues of honesty, perseverance, technical knowledge and faithfulness are paramount and it is these which have contributed to the marvelous growth and the present importance of this business in Monroe, and richly rewarded the devotion to these principles.

FIRST PERMANENT NURSERY BUSINESS

Since 1846, in which year Israel E. Ilgenfritz came to Monroe and in a modest way began to raise trees for market, when the first permanent business was set upon its feet, the growth of this industry has grown to its enormous present proportions. A wonderful development-now among the most stable and important industries in the United States and proudly claimed by Monroe as its leading one. Israel E. Ilgenfritz. was the actual founder of it, and his first activity was with a small nursery upon what has been known as the Church Farm, on the north side of the River Raisin, extending back from the river, along the road known as Anderson street. An incident connected with this first real movement for a nursery on a large scale, is mentioned by Very Rev. Father F. A. O'Brien, formerly of Monroe, now Dean of Kalamazoo parish, in a paper read before the State Historical Society, in 1904, and connecting it with Rev. Father Edward Joos then priest of St. Mary's church, "A notable benefit arising from his desire to do good and his willingness to aid meritorious effort in the community was the beginning of the great nursery business of the Ilgenfritz Company in Monroe. Mr. Ilgenfritz, having not much else but his energy, his executive ability and established character, with confidence in himself, laid his plans before Father Joos who at once made a lease of a large tract of the Church Farm at a nominal sum and extended a liberal credit until he could pay the rental from the sale of trees, which he then planted. An exercise of judgment and foresight which he never regretted. That there was a tentative effort made before that of Mr. Ilgenfritz is shown in the ancient advertisement below, found in the Monroe Advocate of 1844. This appears to be the first firm to issue a catalogue of their business and this a very modest pamphlet.

MONROE NURSERY AND GARDEN

"The subscribers have for the last four years been engaged in the Nursery business in this place, and intend to prosecute it as extensively as their means will allow, and the demand justify. Their nursery now contains more than one hundred thousand fruit trees, which have either been engrafted or inoculated. Every exertion in their power has been put in requisition in obtaining the choicest varieties of fruit, and such as they can warrant to be genuine. The following is a list of the number of the different varieties of fruit trees, most of which are ready for market: