Eastern Washington Bets on Beet Sugar
Prominent regional figures file articles of incorporation for a new sugar factory in Waverly, signaling a push for industrial agriculture.
Spokane, Feb. 28.—K. H. Morrison, of Fairfield; ex-Gov. Miles C. Moore, of Walla Walla, and George Turner, of Spokane, today filed articles of incorporation for the Waverly Beet Sugar Manufacturing Company, with a capital stock of $1,000,000. It is proposed to erect a million-dollar beet sugar factory at Waverly, in this county. It is understood that Chicago capitalists are back of the enterprise. E. H. Dyer, an engineer who built factories at Grand Island and Norfolk, Neb., has inspected the site at Waverly and made a study of the quality of sugar beets raised by the State Agricultural College. He said today that the area is the best he has seen in the United States and that the soil of this section is excellent.
“He said today that the area is the best he has seen in the United States and that the soil of this section is excellent.”
The late 19th-century obsession with 'boosterism' and industrializing the landscape through large-scale agricultural projects like sugar beet factories was a hallmark of the era's economic development. While the specific factory is long gone, the tension between local agricultural identity and the influence of outside 'Chicago capital' remains a persistent narrative in regional economic history.
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