USA > Kentucky > Jefferson County > Louisville > The city of Louisville and a glimpse of Kentucky > Part 4
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One of the most commanding industries of the city and in which it surpasses any other iu the world, perhaps, is the manufacture of plows. There are four establishments, making a product valued at $2, 275,000 and employing 1,925 work- men. One of these is the largest in the world and sends its plows to every country where modern agricultural metbods are pursued. It received the first medal for plows especially desigued for farming in Hindostan, and is introducing American plows in Mexico and Australia. The number of plows made in Louisville in 1880 was 80,000. In 1886 it had increased to 190,000, and the capacity of the largest establishment has been materially enlarged in 1887. The value of all agricultural implements manufactured in Louisville iu 1880 was $1,220,700. In seven years the value of plows alone has
Residences on Chestnut Street.
nearly doubled this.
Hydraulic cement is made largely, the product of the mills operating upon the cement stoue iu the bed of the Ohio river and adjoining, reaching nearly a mill- iou barrels annually. The sales in IS86 were $50,000 barrels.
The reputation of fine oak- tanned sole and haruess leather made in the Louisville tauueries is world wide. The extraordinary finish of the work attracted the at- tention, some years ago, of the tanuers of kid leather iu Frauce and they seut a commission to Louisville to examine iuto the secret. There are twenty-two tau- neries located about the falls, six- teeu of which are in Louisville. The value of the annual product is $2,500,000, and nearly 800 hands are employed.
In the sale of mules it is the largest market, the sales aggregat- ing about 12,500 annually.
In all the manufactures into which wood and iron enter, Louisville is being recognized as one of the most promising points in the country. Recently one of the largest veneering mills in the United States removed its entire plant from New York City to Louisville, where it has erected large buildings and is using forty acres of land and about 500 work- men. A wagon manufacturing company was offered large capital and free grants of land, exempt from taxation, to remove to several of the "boom " cities West aud South. The company invested $40,000 in a new site in Louisville instead and will sooni have the largest establishment of its kind in the country. The furniture manufactories employ 1,200 workmen and make annually a product valued at 1,775,000. The reputation of the furniture is high.
In connection with the account of the trades and industries in which the city has been growing, it is proper to men- tion various importaut manufactures which are insufficiently supplied, or in which Louisville and the State are almost altogether lacking, and which could be created or extended. These involve the production of a number of articles for which there is a large, steady, and increasing demand, not only in Louisville, but in the immediate and great territory which Louisville can supply. Such articles have so far been imported, wholly or in part, from Europe or from points in the East, North-east, and Middle States of this country. They may be classified and discussed as follows :
ARTICLES OF FOOD FOR CONSUMPTION .- Manufactures of olives and various sweet oils, sugar aud syrup refineries, cheese factories, preserving establishments are needed. A cottou-seed oil refinery has been started and is growing. It is also making cotton-seed-oil soap. Iu vinegar, pickles, sauces, mustard factories there is a growing number of establish- ments, large and small, and a marked increase of production and distribution.
WOODENWARE .- Buckets, wash-tubs, and wash-boards, which, for many years, have come almost exclusively from Pennsylvania aud Ohio ; hrooms and the building of ships from timber on the Ohio; all these are needed and would be welcome. There is still room for various agricultural implements to expand the great center which the making of plows, etc., have created of Louisville in the implement trade.
METALS .- Crucible steel, cast, and metal works; rolling mills for bar iron, pig iron, and railroad iron and steel ; manufacturing of nails, axes, horseshoes, iron castings, hardware, cutlery, type are needed. A great rolling mill, many years successfully established in the interior of the State, removed to Louisville last season, and is now successfully making boiler plate, bar iron, and other rolling mill products of the best grades, with orders ahead of capacity. A chain works has resumed (had been abandoned). A new factory, making plumbers' castings and fittings, has just started. Nail mills, cutlery, horseshoe, and various heavy and small hardware and iron factories are still lacking.
MINERALOGICAL AND CHEMICAL ARTICLES .- Various glasswares-window glass, flint glass, pressed glass, tableware ; crockery ware potteries ; starch, of which hundreds of thousands of boxes are brought here annually from the East ;
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chemicals, dye, and paint stuffs. All these are needed. Two factories are making bottles on a liberal scale. One fair- sized and several small potteries are making jugs and crockery. DePanw's works are making plate, window, and bottle glass at New Albany. But there is room for window and pressed glassware potteries.
TEXTILE FABRICS .- Cotton mills for spinning and weaving ; manufacturing of the common, medium, finer, and cost- lier articles of cotton, sheeting and prints, calicoes, ginghams ; of woolen, flaxen (linen), silken, and mixed stuffs, wraps for woolen goods, cotton yarns, cottonades, twine, carpet chain, osnaburgs, brown sheetings, tickings, denims, and other descriptions of heavy, plain, coarse cotton goods, and later following finer work. Though a considerable part of the cotton passing Louisville, mostly for New York and Liverpool, was sold here, no bale was worked into fabrics, no spindle whirls, no thread is spun, and no yard is woven. Further : With an annual production of 25,000,000 pounds of wool in the West and South, there are in Louisville but four factories for woolen goods, combined with cotton. We need several more for blankets, flannel, cassimeres, broadcloths, knit goods, pilot cloth, petershams, hosiery, carpets, oil cloth, waxed cloth, tapestries, etc., clothing, hats. There is no carpet manufactory in the whole West. Most, or all, of these goods are brought here, as yet, from Eastern places and Europe.
SMALL WARES .- All that class of so-called " loft manufactories," so numerous in the East, and employing so much skilled and unskilled labor. Louisville originates great quantities of heavy freights, but not nearly as much in small wares as could be profitably turned ont. Hundreds of the sundry items distributed by the many grocery, hardware, and
VIEW IN CAVE HILL.
other jobbers here are bought elsewhere and ought to be made here. Cabinet and saddlery hardware, trimmings, wood and metal, are used and distributed here to large amounts, and very little of it made here.
LEATHERWARE .- Various leather manufactories are needed, such as belting (which is made on a small scale), all kinds of patent leather, gloves, and fancy articles. Boots and shoes for the trade are manufactured, and could be made in larger quantities. One of the factories, at least, is making a fine article, and Louisville ladies' fine shoes are finding a growing market. There is no reason whatever why most or all of the leatherware for the home market should not be manufactured here. With reference to capital invested in tanneries, and value of product, Louisville takes high rank among the places of the United States, and the first rank among the places west of the Allegheny mountains.
STRAW MANUFACTURES .- Hats and other articles ; none here.
PAPER .- Brown wrapper of all descriptions might be made here, but is not; some kinds of writing and book paper are made ; no strawboard is manufactured here, though a great deal of it is consumed. Paper twine and papier-mache works do not exist here.
BRICKS .- The manufacture of patent or pressed and fancy brick and tile ought to be, and is being, developed more largely. We are consumers, and have the clay and most other ingredients right here.
POWER .- Louisville is still without a steam power ball for the rent or lease of power and rooms to mechanics, artisans, and artists with limited means, for the manufacture of articles on a small scale, establishments which have proved very successful and profitable for owners and tenants in the Eastern States. A power and land company which would provide power and space would attract and develop a class of industries which we lack, and accommodate others we have, and originate many.
BANKS AND BANKING.
The banking capital of Louisville has thus far been sufficient to carry on the business of the city. There are twenty- two banks established, representing a capital of $9,201,Soo with an aggregate surplus of $2,565,279. They are all pros-
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perous and in a healthy condition, managed by enterprising and public-spirited citizens. The capital and deposits of the twenty-one bauks represented in the Clearing-house Association July 1, 1887, were as follows ;
BANKS.
CAPITAL.
DEPOSIT.
Bank of Kentucky
$1,645,100
$ 792,451 86
Bank of Louisville
655,000
299,715 24
Bank of Commerce
800,000
1,036,036 57
Merchants' National Bank
500,000
1,203, 104 63
First National Bank
500,000
834.719 21
Kentucky National Bank
500,000
2,291,837 02
Falls City Bank
400,000
1,261,504 51
Second National Bank
300,000
589,846 OI
Louisville City National Bank
400,000
586,615 77
Citizens' National Bank
500,000
1, 158,933 36
Farmers' & Drovers' Bauk
301,700
621,499 21
People's Bank .
150,000
261,341 85
German Insurance Bank
249,500
1,489,032 21
Masonic Savings Bank
250,000
1,076,895 19
Germau National Bank
251,500
672,000 00
Western Bank .
250,000
735,732 13
Third National Bank
300,000
528,379 49
German Security Bank
179,000
739,214 79
German Bank
188,400
1,503,326 04
Louisville Banking Company
300,000
1,607,329 52
Fourth National Bank
300,000
637,624 09
Totals
$8,920,200
$19.927,138 70
From the annual clearings of the association is also to be obtained the best idea of the increase of business. The association was established in 1876 and the clearings for that year were $107,000,000. For the past five years they were as follows : 1882, $193,000,000 ; 1883, $214,000,000 ; 1884, $211,000,000 ; 1885, $217,000,000 ; 1886, $233,000,000. This shows a steady and very large increase of the volume of business, but it is greatly exceeded by the reports of 1887, which have shown an average increase in round numbers of a million a week. The clearings for 1887 will, therefore, reach about $290,000,000. It can be better grasped when it is stated that the increase of business alone in Louisville for 1887 is equal to half the aggregate business of Detroit and that the aggregate business of Louisville for 1887 is three times as great as that of Detroit in 1886. During the eight mouths ending September 30th, there were nearly fifty new manufacturing establishments planted in Louisville, while many already founded were greatly enlarged and improved. Some of the new enterprises are very important concerns, which have been removed thither from other cities, bringing all their plants and workmen. During the eight mouths referred to, about 1,400 new buildings were erected at a cost of about $4,000,000.
REAL ESTATE.
Real estate values in Louisville are influenced by conditions existing in but very few cities in this country and which produce results of incalculable valne to the actnal owner and nser of property. The most important fact affecting real estate is the great available supply. The city is built at the northern extremity of a plain covering an area of seventy or eigbty square miles. The corporate limits include abont twelve and one-half square miles with 144 miles of paved streets. There are 124 miles of horse and steam street and suburban railways, a greater mileage in proportion to the size of the city than can be found anywhere else in the country. The street railway lines have never been required to purchase their franchises, and the cost of extension being comparatively small, the lines have been carried ont in many instances in advance of the growth ; this, with a fixed fare of five cents and a liberal system of transfers, has tended to build np the suburbs and relieve the pressure upon the center of the city. The noticeable results of these conditions have been to make desirable property cheaper for manufactories, residences, and business honses than in almost any city of approxi- mate population in the world. Below will be found the assessed values of real estate and of permanent improvements in 1880 aud for each year since, taken from the records for assessments :
YEARS.
VALUE OF LAND.
VALUE OF IMPROVEMENTS.
TOTAL VALUE.
1880
$27,149,665
$23,045,000
$50,194,665
1882 .
28,999,269
23,767,015
52,766,274
1883 .
29,342,601
24,225,840
53,568,441
1884
28,993,856
24,253,734
53,247,590
1885
30,581,719
26,399, 14I
56,980,860
1886
30,690,026
26,967,965
57,657,991
1887 .
31,550,000
28,500,000
60,050,000
28,475,355
23, 112,553
51,587,908
An analysis of this table would show the very singular fact that while the increase of land valnes has been $4,400,335, and the (nominal) value of improvements erected has been $5,455.000, there has been practically little appreciation of the value of general property already improved, and this, notwithstanding the fact that the increase of population has been variously estimated at from 45,000 to 60,000 in that time. The only addition to values has been that added to vacant lots by the erection of improvements thereon. Improvements in Louisville are assessed at about fifty per cent. of their cost and realty at about two-thirds of its fair market value. The actual increase of improvements, therefore, has been about $10,000,000, while only about $4,500,000 have been added to the realty value. Few cities can make such a showing
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and invite population to homes so cheap, workshops so lightly taxed, or business houses at such fair rental. Nowhere for purposes of actual use are there more inviting opportunities for real estate investments as in Louisville.
Below is a table of the comparative values of unimproved property in various cities, showing very strikingly the low prices that prevail in Louisville by contrast with other places. While high-priced real estate is valnable for speculators, it is a curse for the actual user, because it increases his taxes and his risks. Low-priced ground enables a population to base prosperity upon the surest of foundations :
BEST RETAIL CORNER LOTS.
BEST RETAIL INSIDE LOTS.
BEST RESIDENCE CORNER LOTS.
MEDIUM RESI- DENCE INSIDE LOTS.
WORKINGMEN'S RESIDENCE INSIDE LOTS.
ACRE PROPERTY ADJOINING CITY LIMITS.
CITIES.
POPULA- TION IN 1880.
Depth feet.
Per front ft.
Depth feet.
Per front ft.
Depth teet.
Per front ft.
Depth feet.
Per front ft.
Depth feet.
Per front ft.
Per acre.
Cleveland
160,1.42
165
$3.500
175
$3,000
600
$500
200
SIOO
125
$40
$1,500
Detroit
116,342
100
2,000
100
1,500
150
350
200
150
126
25
Milwaukee
115,578
150
1,500
120
1,000
120
200
120
So
120
20
3,000
Kansas City
55,813
132
2,500
132
1,Soo
150
175
132
65
132
25
5,000
St. Paul
41,498
150
1,200
150
Soo
200
300
150
6c
120
20
5,000
Toledo .
50,143
IO6
1, 100
106
1,000
330
125
150
60
120
15
1,000
Chicago
503,304
100
4,500
175
3,000
ISO
700
150
150
I20
36
7,000
Omaha .
30,518
132
1,200
132
1,000
132
150
I32
60
132
25
5,000
Indianapolis
75,074
202
800
200
600
200
175
175
60
125
IC
400
Minneapolis
16,887
200
1,500
160
1,500
100
300
160
80
225
35
Louisville
123,645
ISO
1,000
180
650
180
225
180
So
ISp
20
1,000
INCREASE OF MANUFACTURES.
The wonderful cheapness of real estate, the proximity of great supplies of raw material and fuel, and the wonderful increase of railroad facilities since 1880 have been the factors in a remarkable growth of industries in that time. The statistics of manufacturing expansiou since 1870 are shown below and it will be noticed that the increase since 1880 has been little short of magical. The census reports furnish the following facts in regard to the natural growth of manufact- uring in Louisville :
Value of products, 1870
$18,826,349
Greatest number hands employed, 1870 . . 10,315
Value of products, ISSO
35,908,338
Greatest number hands employed, ISSo . . 21,937
Value of products, 1886
66,508,700
Greatest number hands employed, 1886 . . 39,125
Increase, 1870 to 1880
11,622
Increase, ISSo to 1886
$17,081,989 30,600,362
Increase, 1870 to ISSO Increase, ISSo to ISS6 .
17,188
While the population increased twenty-five per cent. from 1870 to 1880 the manufactures increased nearly one hun- dred per cent., and while population from 1880 to 1886 increased about forty per cent. manufactures increased about ninety per cent. This is evidence that more and more of the resident population is being utilized in manufacturing establishments, which means eventually a population of skilled and educated mechanics.
TAXATION AND ASSESSMENTS.
One striking advantage to manufactories located in Louisville is to be found in the provision made for low taxes on all properties dedicated to manufacturing purposes. The nominal tax-rate of the city is $2.04 on the Stoo for the current year, but the rate on manufacturing property judicionsly situated is far less. For instance, the lands situated sonth and west of the city are more es- pecially adapted for industrial establishments, factories and founderies, mills and workshops, elevators and railroads affording transpor- warehouses, ou account of the high, dry, level, aud cheap grounds, the proximity of tation from and to all parts of the country, and of the good drainage by sewers, indispensable for the carrying on of various branches of industry. The lands partly lying within the corporation lines of the city are assessed for taxation at about two-thirds of their market value, and if laid out in lots and improved pay the full city tax, amounting for the fiscal year to $2.04 on the $100 assessed value. Beside, they pay State tax amounting to fifty-one cents on the $100. County tax is not levied ou property within the city limits. Part of such lands, not laid out and not improved, called "acre property" pay the city tax only for railroads and schools, sixty cents on the $100, heside the State tax of fifty-one cents in 1886. Other parts of the lands extending for miles iu the western, southern, and eastern direction and some contiguous to railroads and sewers, as well as to the Ohio river, are situated outside of the corporation lines ENTRANCE TO CAVE HILL. of the city and pay only State tax and county tax, which, in 1886, amounted to seventy-one cents on the $100 assessed value. They are in every respect more suitable for the es- tablishment and successful carrying on of factories and foundries and all branches of industry and trade. Further city taxes are : On assessable investments, less bona fide indebtedness, sixty cents on each $100 for railroad and schools.
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Other personalty and realty and improvements, $2.04 on the $100 on an assessment of two-thirds value. Head tax, $2.00. Licenses, for carrying on various classes of business, professions, or crafts, rates fixed according to their character and volume.
The amendments to the charter of the city of Louisville relating. to assessments provide : Household goods, etc., of the value of $300, when owued and possessed by bona fide residents of Louisville who are housekeepers and the heads of families, shall not be subject to taxation by the city. United States bonds and city of Louisville bonds are exempt from city taxation. Under the charter of the city of Lonisville, approved March 3, 1870, and amendment of April 15, 1882, Section 2, stock of corporations engaged in, and created for, manufacturing and commercial purposes, and couducting business in said city, shall not be liable for taxation by said city. And under an act to amend the charter of the city of Louisville, approved April 8, 1882, Section 2 provides that no tax shall he assessed on tools, implements, or material of manufacture in said city, nor any license be required of them for selling their own mannfactures. In the same act to amend the charter of the city of Louisville, approved April 8, 1882, Section 2 provides that merchandise on which a license tax is charged and paid shall not be liable to he assessed under the provisions of this act. The act to revise and amend the tax laws of the city of Louisville, approved April, 1884, does not materially alter the previous laws relating to the sources of revenue, the objects to be assessed for, and the values exempted from, taxation, and what changes there are have been considered iu the above statement.
These unusually low tax-rates provided for all manufacturing enterprises, united to the many natural advantages, onght to induce a large accretion of capital. Not only are the taxes at present reasonably low if rightly understood, but the charter and ordinances of the city provide also for various exemptions from taxes, more particularly on industrial establishments and their products.
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Historical and Descriptive.
+
S OUISVILLE has been the center from which radiated much heroic history. As Vincennes, in Indiana, was the advanced post at which the Freuch made their stand for the glory of French enterprise and arms, so Louisville was the headquarters of all the valor and the military operations that were finally to result in the conquest of the great North-west Territory by that dauntless young chieftain, General George Rogers Clark, and the extension of the domain of the United States from the Ohio river to the great lakes and the present northern limits. A profound prehistoric interest attaches to the site of Louisville as the scene of the last great battle between the Indians and the people who preceded them. Nothing is known of the ori- gin, character, and fate of these prehistoric people except from the fables that were left, and which have been challenged or contradicted by the ornaments, utensils, and monuments occa- sionally discovered. They were skilled in the use of copper, and the remains of mounds and fortifications show that they had considerable geometrical knowledge, and, perhaps, warlike ingenuity and conrage. The first white settlers heard from the Indians a shadowy tradition to the effect that ages before there had dwelt in the Ohio Valley a numerons and powerful race with whom the Indians waged a war of extinction. The decisive, final battle, as said before, was fought at Louisville. The remuant of the defeated prehistoric race retreated for refuge to an island just below the falls where they were pursued and exterminated by the Indiaus. The location of the present island in front of Louisville, and the discovery of traces of a great burying-ground on the banks of the river opposite, have been pointed out as giving probability to the story. There are, however, topographical evidences that ages ago the course of the Ohio river was back of the present site of Louisville, and the final retreat of the exterminated race-if there was any-was on the ground where Louisville now stands, while the battle might have been fought on the great plain some six or eight miles south of the city, where several beautiful hills might have furnished strategic opportunities.
The burying-place referred to as being partial evidence upon which the Indians based THE CATHEDRAL SPIRE. their tradition of the battle was found opposite Lonisville a little below the village of Clarksville, Indiana. It was evidently the site of an Indian village, covered to the depth of six feet with allnvial earth. In 1819, when the discovery was made, large quantities of human bones in a very ad- vanced stage of decomposition were found interspersed among the hearths and scattered in the soil beyond them. The village must have been surprised by an enemy, and, after the battle which ensned, the bones of the combatants in large numbers were left upon the spot. It was argued that, had it been a common burial-place, something like regularity would have been shown in the disposition of the skel- etons, and that they would not have been found on the same level with the fire- places of an extensive set- tlement, but below it. remains of twenty or more were taken, making it very probable that the former were designed for the mau- solenms of chiefs or dis- tinguished persons, the lat- ter for those of the commu- nity.
A number of other in- teresting prehistoric re- mains have been discovered A few miles below the city, sixty years ago were discovered two stone hatch- ets, at a depth of forty feet, near an Indian hearth, on which, among other vesti- ges of a fire, were found two charred brands, evidently the extremities of a stick that had been consumed in the middle on this identical spot. The plain on which THE CITY HALL. these hatchets were found is alluvial, and this fact about Louisville. Mounds or tumuli were, at an early day, tolerably numerous. Many have been opened by the curious, and the earth hauled away. In most of these only human bones, but sometimes a few bones of the deer were found. Some contained but one skeleton, but from other mounds of similar size the gives rise to the question, where was the Ohio river when the owners of these hatchets were seated by this camp fire? It certainly could not have been in its present place for these remains were below its level.
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