How American Goods Are Flooding the Netherlands
!
DUTCH GIRLS LIKE THE3 AMERICAN 8EWINQ MACHINES SCENE IN THE SCHOOL, OF SEW
ING AT ALKMAAR, HOI, LAND.
(t'opyrlKht. 1903. by Frank Q. Carpenter.)
1OTTERDAM, Jan. 21. (Special Cor
I reponlence of The Bee.) I
lUDuca mjr toe on me American
Invasion the moment I landed In
Rotterdam. The obstruction was
a equare box marked:
Organ.
Frnm MerMen. Cnnnectlcut. XT. fl. A.
C. Keltnem Oroote MaRazlJnen van Planoa.
Kalveratraat, Amaterdam. .
A little further on were barrela ot ma
chine oil from New York, and next to this
a lot ot American aewlng machines in
crates. Out in the river Maas, anchored to
a floating buoy, were great fteamera un
loading Minneapolis flour Into two large
barges to be sent up the Rhino, and all
along the Doompjes were American goods
tf various kinds.
I took a carriage and drove ror aeveial
miles up the wharves, crossing the bridges
to I hp NoordereUand and onto the left bank
of (he Maas. We went by warehouse lifter
warehouse, and everywhere I saw more or
lesa stuff from the United States. ;
Ou the Holland-American quay there vraa
an acre or so ot cotton bales from Qalrea
ton awaiting transhipment tor toa Dutch
cotton mills. Nearby was a yard filled
with resin barrela from Savannah which
gave forth a amell like a canning factory,
which stuck In my nostrils until drlvon out
by the coffee warehouses where the rich
smelling beans cf Java and Sumatra were
btlng loaded on a ship for New York.
At one place I stopped my caxriaga and
photographed a wagon load of Standard
Oil barrels, and at another I took a snap
shot of a gang of Dutch emigrants about to
board a ship for Nev York; I aw car
goes ot American lumber, buckets and boxes
of American meata, wagon loads of lard
and tallow and all sorts of crates holding
American machinery. One Item waa a
cargo of Chicago mowing machines being
loaded on barges for the Interior ot north
ern Europe, and another was bargo after
barge of American cottonseed oil which
passed through under one of the draw
bridge as I waited to croas.
At the same time I saw a score of ocean
steamers loading for Asia, Africa and the
Dutch East Indlea and rode past miles and
miles of river aud canal craft.
Aa I went on I could aee something of the
enormous business which the Dutch hae
with the rest of the world. They are thu
little giants of commercial Europe. They
do not number as many as three tlmea the
population of Chicago, but they have twlcv
as much foreign trade aa - the 120,000,000
Russians, three times as much aa the Span
lards or Italians and twice as much aa the
whole South American continent. Holland
standi sixth In the point of business done
among the commercial nattona ot the world,
and about one-tenth ot Its trade Is with the
United States. It makes exchanges to the
extent of more than $1,000,000,000 a year,
and it annually buya more than $100,000,000
worth ot gooda from us.
Let us stop a moment and think what
this means. This little country has in
round numbers just about 6,000,000 people,
cr 1.000,000 families, but it buys $100,000,000
worth ot Uncle Sam's goods every year.
Thla means that on the average every
family buya $100 worth annually and thla
notwithstanding its salea to us will not
average more than $11 or $15 per family.
Of course, lui'ch ot the goods are bought
to sell again, and some go to the Dutch
East Indies, which are eighty tlmea as
large as Holland itself, but the trade la
there all the same, and the business !s so
big that it will pay the most careful nurs
ug and the most enthusiastic pushlug.
The 8outh American continent la less Im
portant to us than Holland. Our . trade
with the Chinese brings in nothing like
as much as our trade with the Dutch, and
In its possibilities it is worth as much as
the business of any of the countrlea ot
Europe with the exception of England,
Germany and France and that undeveloped
empire, Russia.
Just now Is the best time to Increase this
1 L3T
A " a
trade. The Dutchmen do not like the
English. They can't get over the troubles
of their South African cousins, the Boers,
and other things being equal, they will
give the United States the preference every
time. There are hundreds of articles which
we make that ought to be sold here, and by
studying the wanta of the people end drum
ming the trade there can be an enormous
Increase.
But first let me tell you what our busi
ness now consists of. I have before me the
Dutch reports from the United Statea for
the first half ot the year 1900. They are a
little old, but the trade is practically the
same today. I will give you some ot the
Items. They consist ot cotton, cottonseed
oil, lard, tallow, margarine, meat and to
bacco, as well as a large variety ot othel
articles.
The cotton they bought amounted to 20,
000,000 pounds, equal to more than 3,000,006
pounds of cotton per month. This went
to the Dutch mills and a large part ot It
was made Into clothes for Java, Sumatra
and different parts of Africa.
The cottonseed oil weighed Just twice
aa much as the cotton Itself, and thereby
hangs a tale. These Dutch are among the
chief artificial butter makers of tbe world.
They bought 43,000,000 pounds of margarine
of us during that six months, but at the
same time they used this forty-odd million-pounds
of cottonseed oil to make
other margarine and low-grade butter, for
use not only in Holland, but In England
and other parts ot Europe. There la one
factory here which makea over 3,000,000
pounds ot such butter every month. A
Frenchman invented tbe process ot mak
ing this butter, but the Dutch have the
biggest factories and they 1o tbe bulk of
the world's business slong this line. They
make alao cow butter for export, ao much,
Indeed, that Holland has been called tbe
dairy farm of London.
Our biggeat Dutch export in point ot
weight Is American corn. In this six
months it amounted to almost 100,000,000
pounda per month and brought In several
millions of dollars. What do you suppose
It waa used forT To feed the Holatein cat
tle, to furnish butter for London? No, the
grass her is good and It makea the sweet
est of milk. For cornbread for the people?
No, the Dutch don't eat maize, though
they take vast quantltlea ot our second
grade flour and like it. What, then? I
can easily ahow you if you will come with
me to Schiedam, a little way out from Rot
terdam. At that place are the great dis
tilleries which make the Holland gin or
schnapps. There are 200 of them, and their
business is to grind up American corn and
reduce It to alcohol, which mixed in a cer
tain way with the juice of the juniper
berry forms gin. Holland gin Is considered
the best, and the Dutch think It Is the
best drink of the world. They consume
vast quantities of It and It warms them
body and soul. It Is used not only here, but
throughout the Dutch East Indies, where
the hotels give you free gin cocktails be
fore every meal and where the people drink
gin almost every hour of the day.
A large part of what Holland sells to t s
li gin, alcohol and wlnea. She aends us
Java coffee and something like 2,000.000
pounds of spices every year, all of which
comes from her colonies In the East Indies.
Rotterdam Is by far the best place for
pushing our trade. It la, with the excep
tion of Hamburg, the best distributing
point on the coast of northern Europe, and
It has fewer trade restrictions than Ham
burg. The city is about alxteen miles back from
the sea, built upon plies on both banks of
the Maas. The plies are driven as much
aa fifty feet Into tbe soli and upon them
have bo.n constructed miles ot stone quays,
enormous warehouses and a city ot about
350,000 people. The town controls all pub
lic Improvements, and it la spending vast
sums to Increase its shipping facilities rnd
trade. If I remember correctly tbe cost of
deepening the river Maas. so that the big-
-
I
t:
n ? mTffiT
AMERICAN SKYSCRAPER
gest ocean steamships could come right into
the city, waa more than $16,000,000. This
work, however, hi.s made Rotterdam au
perlor to Amsterdam as a port, and it now
ranks second among the ports of con
tinental Europe, and U aurpassed by none in
Its safety and In Ha conveniences for
handling gooda. I have spoken of Its miles
of stone qua) a.
It has also shipyards and floating dry
docka and every means of repairing and
taking care of shipping. It has mooring
buoys In the Maas, so that the vessels can
unload Into the bargee In midstream, and
its qusys are ao fitted with cranes that all
sorts ot freight can be rapidly moved. At
present there are seventy-flve ocean lines
which call regularly at Rotterdam, and the
river and canal craft which annually enter
this port number 125,000. The river Is al
ways free from Ice, and business goes on all
the year round.
In my ride around the wharves I was
surprised at the number ot ships loading
for and unloading from the United States.
Our trsdo Is very Important to Holland.
Of all its tonnage more than 26 per cent
comes from our country, and the only
rcuntry which surpasses the United States
In this la Great Britain, which has about
76 per cent of the total tonnage, but some
of this consists of American goods which
come to Holland via England.
There are more than 400 ahtps leaving
Rotterdam every year for the United
Statea, or more than one every day. There
are thirteen regular ateamshlp lines, which
do business between the two countries.
The Holland-American line la the great
est. It haa a passenger line to New York
and freight steamers for Newport News.
5 '"
- ' to,
r
f
1
J Li
WAGON LOAD OF STANDARD
- afqj A
iruf Hit ; I' 1 1 6
IN ROTTERDAM.
The passenger ships make the journey from
Rotterdam In eight or ten daya, while the
freight ht earners take from nine to twenty
daya.
This line Is making money and It has
for several years paid dividends of 10 per
cent aud upward.
Outside ot the Holland-American line
the chief steamship companies which deal
with the United Statea are freighters, the
most of the vessels going to the southern
statea. There are tank steamers belonging
to the German-American Petroleum com
pany and the American Petroleum company
which ply regularly between Ne York,
Baltimore, Philadelphia and Rotterdam,
and there are tramp steamers which cairy
oil. The Neptune line has one or more
steamers a week to Baltimore. The Coa
mopolltan and the Kevstone lines make
regular shipments to Philadelphia, and the
Johnson Blue Cross line and North Ameri
can Transport line do a buainess between
here and Norfolk and Newport News. Then
there Is the Charleaton Transport line
with Irregular sailings, the Tcxaa Trans
port and the Terminal Transport, with
steamers to New Orleans and Galveston,
and the Gulf Stream line, which sails bi
weekly to the same ports. Barnard &
Co. have ateamers from Savannah to Rot
terdam, and the Cuban line goes fro-n Rot
terdam or Antwerp to New Orleans every
three weeks. There is alao a line from
Holland to Boston, r-lth steamers eve"y
ten days and other linea to Philadelphia
and New York. So you aee that tbe Dutch
American trade keepa the Gulf stream siz
zling tbe greater part of the year.
I have lettera from Chicago to the Hol
land representstlves of Armour Co aud
A,
V:
f c f T
4
OIL BARRELS.
Swift and Company, and I asked my porter
at my hotel where to find them. He took
me to the corner and pointed to . a big
white building facing the river at the end
of tbe Boompjes. "That," said he, "la the
Wltte Huls. It la the only American build
ing In Holland and Is the headquarters of
the chief American firms."
1 crossed several bridges and, strolling
down to It, found It even ao. The building
is on the American plan, although It was
erected by a Belgian. It is made of bricks
faced with white rorcelain tiles. The
Dutch call It a sky-scraper and talk of the
dangerous height, although It has only ten
stories. It la, I am told, the only ten-story
bul.dlng in Europe; It is a giant in Rotter
dam, although in New York it would ba but
a baby. It la perfectly plumb, notwith
standing 900 trees were driven down into
the eand to make lta foundation. The av
erage building of Rotterdam Is of from
three to five stories, and many bullatuQ
Buu iiiui ou inai pane 01 ins
city are apparently drunk.
The American house has electric elevators
worked by little Dutch boya dressed lu
white smocks. It was by them that I went
from story to etory calling on aome of our
largest American agents. I find that the
meat men here are selling vast quantifies
of our meat and lard not only to Holland, -but
to all tbe countrlea along the Rhine!
and that the American Cereal company U
pushing Its goods Into this part of Europe.
It haa Its offices In the American building,
and Its advertlsementa are everywhere. In
deed, the Americans are far better adver
tisers than the Europeans and you aee
"Kwaker Oats," American typewriters, ko
daks and California fruits everywhere.
I find a great many American sewing ma
chines used In Holland. They are acattered
over the continent, and are considered far
superior to any made in Europe. One r two
of our firms are pushing their foreign busi
ness more than any other, and especially
the Singer company, which has its adver
tisements everywhere and branch houses
In all the cities of Eng!and and the conti
nent. In fact, I found a store here ou the
Hoogstraat the Broadway of Rotterdam
which had photographa ot some of the sew
ing schools of Holland, In which the little
Dutch girls are working away on American
machines. One of these pictures Is of a
school at Alkmaar, one of the oldest towns
of Holland.
Not tar from this shop are hardware
storea, with a great variety of American
gooda. Including Philadelphia lawn mow
ers and Michigan pltchforka, and in the
music store. Just over the way, I saw win
dowa filled with the marchea of Sousa
printed with the American flag on the
cover. They are made by a Rotterdam
Arm and sell in sets at 40 centa a copy.
The American shoe does not seem to b
walking into Holland aa rapidly aa could
be desired. The climate is so wet that
thicker soles than oura are needed. Never
theless, it Is no worse than England, an.j
our shoes will sell if properly push?
There Is one store in Rotterdam with a bi
sign above it advertising American foot
wear, and another store, which was in
tended for selling American shoes. Is
vacant. The Dutch merchant opened his
place on contracts which he had with
Americans, leasing one of the best places
and planning to make our shoes a specialty.
Hla gooda, owing to the carelessness of the
American exporters, failed to come on time,
and the result was that he compromised
his lease and gave up the business.
Indeed, the Americana have a bad reputa
tion in Europe as exporters and traders.
We make the best goods, but we don't know
how to sell them. Such trade aa we have
is because our gooda are so good, and not
because of our business ability in selling
or care In filling orders.
Take for Instance an order which a sta
tionery dealer here sent to New York and
had filled at a loss. The man hut a shop
right next to the Wltte Huls. and I dropped
(Continued on Seventh Page.)
