The second largest manufacturing plant in Tacoma which is also the largest plant of its description in the Pacific Northwest, is the railway construction and repair plant of the Northern Pacific Railway at South Tacoma. This enormous plant furnishes employment for 800 men and manufactures and repairs everything in the line of motive power or rolling stock for railroad use. A $60,000 building for an additional boiler shop is now being erected to enlarge the facilities for locomotive work. The shops of the Tacoma Eastern railroad and the Tacoma Railway & Power Company are also located at Tacoma. Adjoining the Northern Pacific plant is a large plant of the Griffin Car Wheel Works, and not far distant from South Tacoma is the largest rolling mill in the State, the plant of the Western Iron & Steel Works at Lakeview. Allied to this class of industrial enterprises are numerous foundries and machine shops for the manufacture of stationary and marine engines and boilers, machinery, saws, architectural iron, bridges, and other products of brass, tin, copper, iron and steel. The Puget Sound Dry Dock & Machine Company, of Tacoma, operates the largest private drydock north of San Francisco.
- 1—Washington Pipe & Foundry Company.
- 2—Tacoma Warehouse & Elevator Company.
- 3—Carstens Packing Company.
- 4—Elevator A and Tacoma Grain Company’s Flour Mill.
- 5—Pacific Starch Company.
Largest Smelter on the Coast.
Still another line of industry in which Tacoma takes the lead, is in the reduction of ores of gold, silver, lead, copper and other metals. The Tacoma Smelting Company’s plant on the waterfront at the north end of the city is the largest smelter on the Pacific Coast. In 1902 the plant was enlarged by the addition of huge copper reduction works which began operations in September, 1902, and a copper refinery, the only plant of its kind west of Great Falls, Montana, is now in course of construction. The Tacoma Smelter began operations in September, 1890. In 1891 an average of fifty-eight men were employed, and the value of the output was $781,133.38. Five hundred men are now employed at the smelter and the output of the plant for the year 1903 was as follows:
| Gold, 176,312.41 ounces | $3,644,377.51 |
| Silver, 1,899,831.64 ounces | 1,016,409.93 |
| Lead, 22,488,377 lbs | 955,756.02 |
| Copper, 10,889,463 lbs | 1,422,853.84 |
| Total value of output | $7,039,397.30 |
The amount paid in wages in 1903 was $264,767.60, freight paid to Northern Pacific railway, $336,751.85, and freight paid to vessels, $164,392.55.