Broadcasting Telecasting (Jan-Mar 1956)

STOCKTON ELEVATORS: The port city is bidding for the title "Grain Capital of the yi^est." This three million bushel terminal is one of the reasons why. nearly all to be found in the state. Some 20 of these are usually million dollar yields and better, including grapes (about $17 million); tomatoes ($14 million); asparagus ($11 million); alfalfa ($9 million); sugar beets, barley, clover, cherries and potatoes (about $4 million each), peaches and walnuts ($3 million each). Mineral resources exploited commercially include glass and sand, gravel, natural gas and brick clay, all up considerably since 1940 to nearly $4 million now. In the past several years local industry has spent nearly $30 million for expansion and new plants. Over 500 firms are located there. The Stockton Chamber of Commerce claims the city permits many large firms to serve the 2 million people of California's central valley with one distribution center instead of two, one to either end. Key distributors there now include General Electric Co., Massey-Harris Co., MinneapolisMoline Co., Graco, New Idea Farm Equipment Co., Gaylord Bros., Zellerbach Paper Co., National Molasses Co., Crane & Co., W. P. Fuller Co., General Paint Co., Sherwin-Williams Co., Pittsburgh Plate Glass Co., Remington Rand, Michael Flynn Mfg. Co. and Blake-Mofntt & Towne. Major manufacturers and producers include International Harvester Co., J. I. Case Co., Koehring Co., J. B. Beaird Co., American Can Co., Continental Can Co., Fiberboard Products, Ludlow Mfg. & Sales Co., George A. Hormel Co., Stokely-Van Camp Inc., General Mills Sperry Division, California Packing Corp., Flotill Products, Kraft Page 118 • January 30, 1956 Foods Co., Holly Sugar Corp. and California Walnut Growers Assn. California Walnut Growers is abandoning its Los Angeles headquarters in favor of Stockton. It is a $7 million move. The cooperative packs and markets 75% of the California walnut crop. Walnut production has shifted from southern California to the central region because of urbanization of Los Angeles. Ralston Purina Co. has one of its largest western branches at Stockton. South of Stockton at Tracy, American Reinforced Paper Co. has erected a new quarter-million dollar plant while H. J. Heinz Co., finding urbanization at Berkeley causing longer raw materials transport, is relocating its principal west coast headquarters here. It is a $1.5 million operation. Nic-L-Silver Battery Co., headquartering in Southern California at Santa Ana near Los Angeles, is doubling its battery output by taking a second plant at Stockton, converting an idle factory through a quartermillion dollar investment. . SACRAMENTO — Sacramento County If Stockton and its inland port can claim to be the economic doorway to the San Joaquin Valley, Sacramento has every right to equal status for the 19-county area to the north, up the Sacramento Valley. Just to keep even, Sacramento is building a $16 million deep-water port on the Sacramento River, so ocean-going ships can replace barges and diesel tugs and give Stockton a run for its money. There is more than friendly rivalry between the two great central valley markets. Local economists differ whether inland industry can support both water terminals. But Sacramento is optimistic. Businessmen there seem to feel that the market growth is more than sufficient to merit the double facilities because the two cities focus their trade influence in opposite directions. But Sacramento has an ace up its economic sleeve. Walk east on Capital Ave. from Fifth Street about 5 o'clock on any weekday and you think you are in a junior-size Washington, D. C. The state capitol's white-and-gold dome rises bright against the sky before you and suddenly you are rushed off your feet by what seems like all 15,300 of the state government's workers. They are heading for nearby cars or up to stores and shops along K St. to spend part of their better-than-average incomes for a variety of products and services. Completed in 1874, the Capitol Bldg. and its Roman Corinthian dignity reminds you of the state's rich heritage. Step inside the new $7.5 million east wing annex a moment and you see contrasted the state's vibrant present. Here, in definite modern sweeps, corridors are lined with permanent window displays of industry and agriculture in each of the 58 counties. The economic today and tomorrow of California distilled into 58 public "test tubes" for critical analysis by thousands of visitors each year. But state government isn't the only big business in Sacramento, market center for the county's 370,000 people. Major U. S. military installations in the area contribute heavily, headed by McClellan Air Force Base with civilian payroll equal to the state government's $68 million local payroll. The Army Signal Depot adds another $10.7 million while Mather Air Force Base shovels in another $3.7 million. Together, the local military establishments top it off with an extra $32.5 million military payroll. County employes take home $7.7 million annually while city workers find $7 million in their pay checks and local Federal workers earn $8.4 million. «• • The various government payrolls combine into a $206 million nest egg, 34.5% of the near $600 million making up the total annual payroll in the county. Where does the other 65.5% come from? Retail establishments paid their workers $79.4 million during the year; wholesale, $21.7 million manufacturing, $47.1 million; finance, insurance and real estate, $15.7 mil-, lion; transportation and utilities, $63 million; contract construction, $41 million; schools and hospitals, $30.7 million; services, $27.9 million; agriculture and mineral extraction, $26.9 million; self-employed, $40.3 million. "And payrolls are a good index of general prosperity," according to Sacramento Chamber of Commerce officials. Leading manufacturing plants contributing heavily to the industrial payroll include Campbell Soup Co., employing 1,400; Bercut-Richards Packing Co., Libby, McNeill & Libby and California Packing Co., major canners employing about 1,300 each; Aerojet-General, a General Tire and Rubber Co. subsidiary which manufactures jet propellants and invested $2 million in plant expansion in 1954, employing 750; and Procter & Gamble Co., whose modern detergent plant employs 250. There is a total of nearly 400 manufacturing plants in the community, chiefly in food and food processing, lumber and wood products, printing and publishing, and fabricated metals. Long a principal warehouse and transshipping center, Sacramento is now developing manufacture. In the past four years some 80 new firms have located at Sacramento, investing more than $20 million. Retail trade in the county increased nearly 50% between 1948 and 1953, when it hit $438.6 million. Last year it was estimated at around $500 million. Since 1950, county post office receipts have jumped over 35% to nearly $5 million. Bank debits are up 25% to $8 billion. Building permits in these six years total $400 million. Capt. John Sutter, a Swiss, founded a fort at what is now Sacramento in the early part of the 19th century to protect his personal agricultural colony. In early 1884, James Marshall was sent west near Placerville to build a saw mill for Capt. Sutter. When he discovered gold in the mill race it rocked the world, setting off an explosive migration that resulted in the abrupt settlement of the entire West. Hired help at the fort left crops and crafts to rush to the gold strike. To save the family fortune, Capt. Sutter's son laid out the "city" of Sacramento in April 1849 at Embarcadero, the river terminal for Sutter's boat line to San Francisco. There were four houses there then. But within seven months 10,000 people swarmed the town, which Broadcasting • Telecasting