Textiles The distribution of the textile industry, illustrated by cotton textiles shown in maps 17-20, bears only a secondary relationship to the location of resources. Only a scattering of cotton textile plants is to be found in the vicinity of the centers of cotton production. Although the piedmont mills are near to an old cotton. raising area, the location of the cotton textile industry primarily reflects the historical development of the industry in New England and its migration to the southern piedmont in quest of a cheap labor supply. Its locational pattern is that of a relatively foot-loose industry bound neither to resources nor to consumers nor yet lying directly along the line of flow from one to the other. Textiles reach their finished stage, for the most part, in clothing. The two main types using cotton cloth are shown in maps 19 and 20. The manufacture of men's cotton garments is very widely dispersed, with plants located in almost every city. Women's clothing, on the other hand, is strongly con✓centrated in New York. The chart with map 20 showing the States leading the industry in employment brings out the localization of this industry even more clearly than does the map of plant location. A major contributing factor in this instance is the fact that New York has been the style capital of the United States. In these two contrasting garment industries, men's cotton garments and women's cotton clothing, textiles manufactured and finished in the industrial area of New England and the southern piedmont move in the first instance into widely scattered industrial and consumer centers and in the second instance into New York and certain other cities. Flows through other branches of the textile industry, wool, silk, rayon and their products, may be traced in appendix 16, maps A-21 to A-28. Taken as a whole the textile and clothing industries shown in this series of maps include 21.3 percent of all persons engaged in manufacturing. They account for a much larger proportion of the manufacturing population in the New England area, in the metropolitan area of New York and Philadelphia and especially in the southern States, where they represent 32, 36, and 38 percent respectively of the manufacturing population. To only a very minor degree are they to be found in that part of the industrial area which falls in the Great Lakes States. Iron and Steel Industries producing iron and steel account for 30 percent of the gainfully employed in manufactures. In the various ramifications shown in maps 21-32, this major industry exemplifies virtually all elements in the geographical structure of American manufactures. In its first stage of mineral extraction and processing it is closely tied to its resource base of iron and coal. Map 24 shows the location of blast furnaces either in the center of the coal and iron fields of Pittsburgh and Birmingham, respectively, or at the points on water routes where coal and iron may be combined in the South Chicago and Gary region, Youngstown, Cleveland, and Buffalo. The remaining blast furnaces shown on the map represent either the remainder of the old forges which used to dot the countryside wherever the many small deposits of iron ore were located, or those that are located in the iron fields of Minnesota and Michigan or the coal fields of Colorado, or near the eastern seaboard and the sources of imported ore. Blast furnace products move by successive stages toward consumers. Steel works and rolling mills shown in map 25 spread out around the blast-furnace centers. In addition they are to be found closer to the industrial centers of the northeast and scatteredly in the cities which lie along the eastern edge of the Great Plains from Fort Worth and Houston to Minneapolis and St. Paul. The next stage of fabrication represented by stamped and pressed metal products shows industry moving away from the blast furnace centers and spreading out through the industrial counties. At this stage the industry has moved away altogether from the Birmingham center. It has established marked concentration in New England and is strongly represented in the Great Lakes States. The maps of later stages present a very different picture. Sheet-metal works and especially machine shops represent the iron and steel industry in the final processes which are carried on of necessity close to the consumer. To a large extent those branches of the iron and steel industry involve the production of specialty articles on order and the fabrication of iron and steel to meet the particular needs of consumers. Whereas a large part of the products of blast furnaces and rolling mills moves by successive stages out from the centers localized by the resources toward activity localized by the consumers, a substantial proportion of the industry's products goes into the type of manufacture which characterizes the industrial area. In fact it is very largely the industries fabricating steel which constitute the main industrial area, especially the Great Lakes region. Here is to be found the automobile industry, map 29, and the manufacture of a wide variety of machinery, equipment, and other steel products. In particular, here are located those industries which serve industry itself, notably machine tools, shown in map 30. The other principal steel fabricating industries located in the industrial area are shown in appendix 16, maps A-29 to A-40. Other industries of Though the map shows a wide scattering of plants, those lying outside of the East North Central and Middle Atlantic States account for only 5 percent of the employment in the industry. similar character are pulled out of the industrial area at least in part by the other activity with which they are associated. Two examples appear in maps 31 and 32. The textile machinery industry lies almost wholly outside of the area where most machinery is made, and is closely tied up with the location of textile factories in New England, New Jersey, and the South. Ship and boat building must perforce be carried on in proximity to oceans and waterways. The iron and steel industry thus has a geographical structure which includes the exploitation or preliminary fabrication of bulky and heavy resources; successive stages in fabrication carried on largely within the industrial area but moving toward the consumers in later stages of fabrication; and branches of the industry involving special fabrication located close to the consumers. In addition there are the major machine producing industries which use steel and largely constitute the industrial area, automobiles, electrical appliances, engines, etc., together with the industrial service industries, notably machine tools. Finally, there are a series of industries fabricating steel in various stages which are mainly or partially located in the industrial area but which have been partly pulled out of that area by the fact that they serve agriculture, serve a particular industry such as textiles, have advantages to gain by proximity to the consumer, or are dominated by some other special factor. Forest Products The several branches of industry utilizing forest products present perhaps the clearest case of the flow from resource to consumer. One branch, the production and utilization of pulp, paper, and newsprint, is presented for illustration in maps 33-36. The first process, that of converting wood into pulp, tends to occur close to the resource for this is a process which converts a bulky product into one easily transported. Map 33 shows the location of pulp mills in juxtaposition to those types of timber products which are suitable for this use. The manufacture of paper shown in map 34 to a slight extent follows the pattern of pulp mills but mainly moves into the industrial centers and toward the centers of population where paper products are used. Map 35 and especially map 36, showing the use of paper for printing and publishing, repeat the map of consumer distribution. As would be expected the printing and publishing of books shows a greater concentration in the cities than does the printing and publishing of newspapers and periodicals. The latter is hardly distinguishable from the map of consumer distribution. Other wood-using industries and supplementary paper-using industries are shown in appendix 16, maps A-41 to A-48. These sample series for selected agricultural, textile, iron and steel, and forest products industries give a representative picture of the characteristics of industrial location. The more extensive series in appendix 16 give a much more complete picture but not one which differs significantly from that which emerges from the industries selected for illustration. Major Industrial Areas The concentration of industrial activity shown in map 6 has been emphasized by the pattern of industrial location which stands out in the map series for individual industries and in the maps contained in appendix 16. The areas of concentration comprise the 33 industrial cities with the metropolitan areas surrounding them, designated by the Census of 1930 as "industrial areas," and 100 additional industrial counties. A closer examination of these areas reveals their central importance in the geographical structure of the economy. The proportion of the total population living in these areas has grown steadily, as industry has played an increasingly important role. In 1870, 23 percent of the population of the United States was living within the 33 census areas. In 1930, the proportion was 35 percent. Figures are not available with which to show the roughly corresponding increase in the proportion of all gainfully employed located in these areas. The location of manufacturing wage earners, however, shows clearly that the proportionate growth in population in these areas was a reflection of the shift from agriculture to industry. Almost as large a proportion of the manufacturing wage earners were located in these areas in 1870 as at present, 53.3 percent in 1870 as compared with 55.5 percent in 1935.o The pattern of manufacturing activity had already largely assumed its present form by the latter half of the nineteenth century. The above evidence of the proportionate stability of wage jobs in the 33 census areas is confirmed by data for the 200 industrial counties. In 1899, the earliest year for which data on these 200 counties are available, 73.2 percent of all manufacturing wage jobs were located in these counties. In 1935, the proportion was 74.47 percent. Chart I shows for 13 of the largest industrial areas, for the 33 industrial areas, and for the 200 industrial counties the proportion of all manufacturing wage earners since 1870. The development of the major industrial area of the northeast, and the secondary areas of the southern Piedmont and the west coast, has been largely the product of history, conditioned by the location of resources. The 33 areas include 100 of the 200 counties shown on map 6, plus 11 small coun ties included in metropolitan areas which are not included in the 200 industrial counties. • Growth of American Manufacturing Areas, Glenn E. McLaughlin, Philadelphia, 7 Is Industry Decentralizing, Daniel B. Craemer, Philadelphia, 1935. |