Buffalo has a most substantial foundation on which to build a manufacturing metropolis. It is a conservative city, full of careful, cautious business men. It has come along by comparatively slow and always steady progress, taking no forward step until strong and ready for it. Commercial depressions have affected us but little. Panics have avoided us, for panics are like plagues and seize hold where the conditions are unhealthy. We have had neither plagues nor panics; we have a healthy city physically and financially.
Now a new era has dawned. We are about to leap to an eminence undreamed of in years gone by. Strong from the strength of right business living we are equal to the swifter pace of the new order of things. The sublime force of the Niagara is chained and diverted to manufacturing uses. Every wheel in Buffalo will be turned by this marvelous power at far less cost than machinery can be run anywhere else in the wide world. There’s a giant force behind the leap. Cheap power! Cheap freights! These are the talismanic symbols of a mighty greatness.
GREAT IMPORTANCE OF THE LAKE TRAFFIC.
The Review of Reviews in a recent article on the traffic of the Great Lakes, proves the extraordinary importance of this traffic and of Buffalo’s location from a commercial standpoint. It must always be borne in mind that the great bulk of the lake traffic is tributary to Buffalo. The article referred to is as follows:
“Few persons who have not made a personal study of the matter realize the magnitude of the traffic of the Great Lakes. There were over 1,100 more vessels passing through the canal into Duluth, Minnesota, in 1891, than passed through the Suez Canal the year previous. Through the “Soo” Canal at the outlet of Lake Superior there were more than three times as many vessels and nearly a million and three-quarters tons more freight in 1890 than through the Suez Canal during the same year. There is not the same absolute record of vessels passing through the Detroit River as is obtainable for the two points previously mentioned. But an estimate made by Hon. George H. Ely, of Cleveland, shows that in 1889 there were more than 36,000,000 tons of freight carried through the Detroit River. This sum seems large when it is stated by itself, but the real magnitude will perhaps be better appreciated when it is known that this is 10,000,000 tons in excess of the tonnage at all the seaports of the United States for the same year, and 3,000,000 tons in excess of the total arrivals and clearances, both coastwise and foreign, of Liverpool and London combined. The arrivals and clearances of vessels at Chicago for 1890 numbered 21,541, while the corresponding aggregate for New York was but 15,283. The entries and clearances for the entire seaboard of the United States in that year were 37,756, while for the United States ports on the Great Lakes the arrivals and clearances numbered 88,280. The traffic of the Great Lakes in 1891 was 27 per cent of the total traffic of all the railways of the United States for the same year, and if the tonnage carried on the lakes had been carried instead by rail, at the average price per ton per mile, it would have cost, in round numbers, $150,000,000 more than was actually paid for its transportation by water.”
BEAUTIFUL GRAND ISLAND.
Down the Niagara river from Buffalo a few miles the noble stream divides and forms Grand Island. This is Buffalo’s watering-place. Hotels, club-houses, summer residences and public pleasure grounds abound all along the river’s banks on either side of the island, while the rich farming land of the interior is devoted to agriculture. The air of the island is pure, the scenery delightful, and the ride upon the river to and from the city is full of restful charm.
Many pleasure steamers ply between the city and the island resorts, and do a large and remunerative business. But for the great mass of busy people some sort of transit more rapid than steamers is necessary. This want is about to be met. A project has lately ripened to build a bridge from the mainland and run an electric railroad across the bridge and clear around the island, connecting with the street railroad system of the city. Long-headed men foresee that when this is accomplished there will be a quick and large appreciation of land values on the island, and it is certain that within the next few years fortunes will be made in Grand Island lands as well as in those of Buffalo and other sections of the mainland. With the increased demand for manufacturing sites, industrial enterprises will certainly seek that portion of the island nearest to Buffalo and Tonawanda, and the other side, facing Canada, will continue to be occupied by summer resorts, club-houses and residences.
CONCLUSION.
In this little volume an effort has been made to acquaint the reader with the splendid present and the glorious future of Buffalo.