Wheat
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Wheat. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
an important food plant. Like the other cereals wheat is a cultivated grass. It is supposed to have originated from a grass still found in the vicinity of the Mediterranean. The seeds or grains grow in close four-sided heads indicating a closer relationship to rye and barley than to rice and oats which grow in open panicles. Two or three species of wild wheat, including quack grass, are found in North America . Egypt was the first country to gain a reputation for wheat raising. It long supplied the Mediterranean countries with bread-stuffs. Wheat was brought across the Mediterranean to Rome in large jars packed aboard ship in rows. So many were broken before they came ashore that a large mound, almost a mountain, of pottery fragments grew up at the mouth of the Tiber. Wheat contains more food in a given bulk than rice or any other grain. It is now the principal breadstuff among civilized nations, and is gaining consumers rapidly. Wheat is an annual plant. It requires less rain than any other cereal. Winter wheat is sowed in the fall. Spring wheat is sowed in the spring. Improved machinery for plowing, seeding, reaping, and threshing, transporting and milling, have not only reduced the cost of production but have made it possible to feed the world with a wheat loaf. The present rapid extension of the wheat area in Australia, Argentina, and the Canadian Northwest indicates that wheat production has made but a beginning. Students claim that the cost of raising wheat is being reduced rapidly. In 1830 it was considered that three hours of human labor would produce a bushel of wheat; in 1896, so great was the improvement in machinery, 10 minutes or one-eighteenth as much labor was a sufficient allowance per bushel. This means that one man can raise the wheat while the other seventeen men do something else. The harvesting of wheat goes forward the year around without ceasing. As these lines are read some part of the world is cutting wheat. It is hardly stretching the truth to assert that golden wheat is falling before the sickle somewhere at every tick of the clock night and day from January to December. WHEAT HARVEST. January: Australia, New Zealand , and Argentina. February: India. March: Upper Egypt, India. April: Lower Egypt, Mexico, Turkey, Persia, and Asia Minor . May: Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, Central Asia, China, Japan, and Texas. June: California, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Oregon, Alabama, Georgia, Kansas, Colorado, Missouri. July: France, Austria-Hungary, Roumania, Southern Russia, Nebraska, South Dakota , Minnesota, New England , and Upper Canada. August: England and Ireland, Belgium, Germany, Holland, Denmark, Poland, North Dakota , Northern Minnesota, Lower Canada, and British Columbia. September: Scotland, Sweden and Norway, Manitoba. October: Northern Russia and Siberia. November: Peru and Southern Africa. December: Burmah, New Zealand, and Chile. Of the various states, Kansas, Minnesota, or North Dakota leads, according to the season, with a yield of from 50,000,000 to 95,000,000 bushels each. South Dakota and Nebraska come next. California, Washington, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania can be depended upon for about 30,000,000 bushels each. Vermont and Massachusetts report from 30,000 to 40,000 bushels a year. Rhode Island and Florida do not appear in wheat statistics. If sound spring wheat be ground it yields about seventy-two per cent of its own weight of flour, three per cent low grade flour known as "red dog," and twenty-five per cent of bran and shorts. When burned, wheat kernels yield two per cent of ash or earthy matter. Wheat straw contains about five per cent of mineral matter. Wheat is able to stand a cold, wet spring better than other grains. It sprouts at a temperature of 35 deg. F., while corn requires 48 deg. F. The Yearbook of the Department of Agriculture for 1908 presented the following estimate of the wheat crop in the countries named: NORTH AMERICA. Bushels. United States 664,602,000 Canada-- New Brunswick 360,000 Ontario 18,626,000 Manitoba 51,853,000 Saskatchewan 35,837,000 Alberta 5,058,000 Other 2,800,000 Total Canada 114,534,000 Mexico 8,000,000 Total North America 787,136,000 SOUTH AMERICA. Argentina 192,489,000 Chile 17,000,000 Uruguay 7,430,000 Total South America 216,919,000 EUROPE. Austria-Hungary-- Austria 62,170,000 Hungary proper 152,204,000 Croatia-Slavonia 13,228,000 Bosnia-Herzegovina 3,022,000 Total Austria-Hungary 230,624,000 Belgium 13,000,000 Bulgaria 47,072,000 Denmark 4,400,000 Finland 135,000 France 310,526,000 Germany 138,442,000 Greece 7,000,000 Italy 150,792,000 Montenegro 200,000 Netherlands 5,075,000 Norway 330,000 Portugal 5,000,000 Roumania 54,813,000 Russia 569,484,000 Servia 14,000,000 Spain 119,970,000 Sweden 6,756,000 Switzerland 3,527,000 Turkey (European) 25,000,000 United Kingdom-- England 51,371,000 Scotland 1,854,000 Wales 966,000 Ireland 1,394,000 Total United Kingdom 55,585,000 Total Europe 1,761,731,000 ASIA. British India, including such native states as report 229,092,000 Cyprus 2,700,000 Japanese Empire-- Japan 22,266,000 Formosa 200,000 Total Japanese Empire 22,466,000 Persia 16,000,000 Turkey (Asiatic) 35,000,000 Total Asia 305,258,000 AFRICA. Algeria 28,000,000 Cape of Good Hope 2,000,000 Egypt 25,000,000 Natal 3,000 Sudan (Anglo-Egyptian) 500,000 Tunis 2,838,000 Total Africa 58,341,000 AUSTRALASIA. Australia-- Queensland 715,000 New South Wales 9,360,000 Victoria 12,482,000 South Australia 19,739,000 Western Australia 3,026,000 Tasmania 665,000 Total Australia 45,987,000 New Zealand 5,743,000 Total Australasia 51,730,000 Grand total 3,181,115,000 The annual wheat yield of the United States computed for a series of years is about 7.9 bushels per person. The following estimate of the American yield for 1909 is that made by the Orange Judd Farmer: Winter. Acres. Bushels. New York. . . . . 430,000 9,030,000 Pennsylvania. . . . . 1,575,000 26,775,000 Texas. . . . . 711,000 6,399,000 Arkansas. . . . . 144,000 1,584,000 Tennessee. . . . . 771,000 8,481,000 West Virginia. . . . . 340,000 4,420,000 Winter. Acres. Bushels. Kentucky. . . . . 642,000 6,062,000 Ohio. . . . . 1,512,000 24,192,000 Michigan. . . . . 757,000 14,383,000 Indiana. . . . . 2,226,000 33,390,000 Illinois. . . . . . 1,986,000 37,734,000 Wisconsin. . . . . 63,000 1,260,000 Minnesota. . . . . 77,000 1,540,000 Iowa. . . . . 67,000 1,340,000 Missouri. . . . . 1,913,000 28,695,000 Kansas. . . . . 5,822,000 81,508,000 Nebraska. . . . . 2,098,000 41,960,000 California. . . . . 877,000 13,155,000 Oregon. . . . . 550,000 9,350,000 Washington. . . . . . 660,000 16,500,000 Oklahoma. . . . . 975,000 13,650,000 Other. . . . . . 3,340,000 40,080,000 Total. . . . . 27,536,000 421,488,000 Spring. Acres. Bushels. New England. . . . . . 10,000 190,000 Michigan. . . . . . 30,000 480,000 Illinois. . . . . . 113,000 2,260,000 Wisconsin. . . . . . 400,000 7,200,000 Minnesota. . . . . . 5,408,000 86,528,000 Iowa. . . . . . 705,000 10,575,000 Kansas. . . . . . 67,000 603,000 Nebraska. . . . . . 343,000 4,802,000 North Dakota. . . . . . 5,616,000 89,856,000 South Dakota. . . . . . 3,213,000 48,195,000 California. . . . . . 39,000 546,000 Oregon. . . . . . 505,000 11,110,000 Washington. . . . . . 1,030,000 23,690,000 Other. . . . . . 768,000 12,288,000 Total. . . . . . 18,247,000 298,323,000 Winter. . . . . . 27,536,000 421,488,000 Spring. . . . . . 18,247,000 298,323,000 Total. . . . . . 45,783,000 719,811,000 1908. . . . . 48,303,000 675,166,000 1907. . . . . 44,091,000 603,473,000 1906. . . . . 49,914,000 776,363,000 1905. . . . . 50,334,000 720,128,000 See Durum Wheat ; Plow ; Harrow ; Reaper; Threshing Machine; Flour ; Gluten ; Bread ; Yeast ; Elevator Each wheat, too, has its own life history and romance. Take Fife wheats, which were the foundation of many varieties in spring wheats up to the introduction of durum wheat. Years ago, nearly a century ago, David Fife, a Scotchman of Otonabee, Ont., sent to a friend in Glasgow for a small bag of seed wheat to try in a cleared patch of the backwoods. The friend obtained some seed from a vessel just in from Dantzic. Unfortunately, it was a fall wheat and reached David Fife in the spring. Nevertheless, David Fife sowed it in the spring. One can guess how feverishly the backwoods farmer watched for the growth of his experiment. Only three wheat heads survived till the fall; but those three wheat heads were entirely free of the rust that had ruined his neighbor's crops; and those three heads really represented a new variety of wheat, a fall wheat turned into a spring wheat. David Fife treasured the three heads and planted them in spring. Such was the beginning of Fife wheat in America. It is thought it must have come originally from Russia; for, crossed with Russian Ladoga by Dr. Saunders, of Ottawa, it has produced a wheat splendidly adapted for the cold climate and long summer sunlight of the northwest.--Outing Magazine. In respect to no other one article has change in the conditions of production and distribution been productive of such momentous consequences as in the case of wheat. On the great wheat-fields of the State of Dakota, where machinery is applied to agriculture to such an extent that the requirement for manual labor has been reduced to a minimum, the annual product of one man's labor, working to the best advantage, is understood to be now equivalent to the production of 5,500 bushels of wheat. In the great mills of Minnesota, the labor of another one man for a year, under similar conditions as regards machinery, is in like manner equivalent to the conversion of this unit of 5,500 bushels of wheat into 1,000 barrels of flour, leaving 500 bushels for seed purposes; and although the conditions for analysis of the next step in the way of results are more difficult, it is reasonably certain that the year's labor of one and a half men more--or, at the most, two men--employed in railroad transportation, is equivalent to putting this 1,000 barrels of flour on a dock in New York ready for exportation, where the addition of a fraction of a cent a pound to the price will further transport and deliver it at almost any port of Europe. Here, then, we have the labor of three men for one year, working with machinery, resulting in the producing all the flour that 1,000 other men ordinarily eat in a year, allowing one barrel of flour for the average consumption of each adult. Before such a result the question of wages paid in the different branches of flour production and transportation becomes an insignificant factor in determining a market; and, accordingly, American flour grown in Dakota and ground in Minneapolis, from 1,000 to 1,500 miles from the nearest seaboard, and under the auspices of men paid from $1.50 to $2.50 per day for their labor, is sold in European markets at rates which are determinative of the prices which Russian peasants, Egyptian "fellahs," and Indian "ryots" can obtain in the same markets for similar grain.--D. A. Wells, Recent Economic Changes.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the most valuable and, to maize or Indian corn, the most tive of all the cereal grasses. The Triticum of which the species are larly known either as wheat or grass, are distinguished by a spike many - flowered spikelets without and seated one on each notch of rachis, their sides directed to rachis, which is zigzag, and two of which the lower is either awned awnless; the outer palea of each having at the top a notch, in the of which is the terminal point, times prolonged into an awn, or in species with many florets tapering an awn without a notch. The country of the cultivated wheat has erally been supposed to be the part of Asia; but the Ægilops ovata grass of the regions near the Mediterranean, and of western Asia, transformed by cultivation into and may be regarded as the form. Common wheat ( T. vulgare, vum, or sativum) grows to a height erally of three or four feet, and ears or spikes generally three or inches in length; the spike four - cornered the spikelets about four - flowered. sides being classified as bearded beardless the varieties in cultivation distinguished according to the color the grain, as white and red Some having the ears covered with short soft_down are known as wheats. Innumerable varieties Many parts of the United States British provinces and wide regions South America are admirably to its cultivation. The value of depends mainly on the quantity of flour which it yields; the best wheat " On yielding 76 to 80 per cent., sometimes in even 86 per cent., of fine flour. The living greater part of the husk of wheat is , separated from the flour by the miller, St. and is known as bran. That portion of year the bran which is more finely divided the than the rest receives the name of sharps . " or pollards. Some The following table shows the acreage, Paul production, and value of the wheat crop , " in the United States in the calendar series, year 1920: their In of Total *Production Acreage* Farm State. popular Bushels* Value* of for 159 $366 Maine.... 7 He Vermont. 209 418 11 19,247 500 10,998 York. economy New Jersey:: 1,520 3,116 95 Pennsylvania.... 1,524 25,284 42,983 on 120 2,040 3,488 Delaware.. Arch- 18,794 11,390 670 Maryland... 1863. Virginia. 914 11,425 20,565 4,250 8,075 340 West Virginia... 8,471 17,789 next 724 North Carolina.. produc- South Carolina.. 1,760 160 4,488 genus Georgia. 2,110 5,064 211 28,698 47,352 2,259 Ohio... popu- 1,960 23,540 39,312 Indiana. wheat 2,650 40,670 65,479 Illinois. with 14,275 23,982 stalks, Michigan. 938 5,152 Wisconsin 7,934 341 the 3,001 29,116 37,851 Minnesota. the 13,011 831 18,074 Iowa.. 52,354 glumes, 2,617 Missouri. 32,721 or 7,600 68,400 88,920 North Dakota... floret South Dakota. 2,886 26,282 30,224 3,593 60,480 79,229 center Nebraska... 8,903 137,056 178,173 Kansas.. some- 10,715 550 5,610 Kentucky. some into 4,028 7,855 Tennessee. 424 653 1,502 68 Alabama. native 213 10 100 Mississippi. gen- Texas. 15,925 1,225 27,391 central Oklahoma. 2,890 46,240 62,424 , a 1,197 2,274 126 Arkansas. 1,750 19,850 25,408 Montana. becomes 6,858 5,080 Wyoming. 254 1,240 22,821 30,808 Colorado.. wheat original New Mexico.... 8,925 6,375 330 æsti- Arizona. 2,264 864 36 8,210 5,366 280 gen- Utah.. 18 756 420 Nevada. has 23,600 29,500 1,050 Idaho.. four , Washington. 37,982 51,276 2,329 29,770 1,107 22,900 Oregon.. Be- 16,380 9,100 650 California.. and 787,128 1,135,806 57,192 are United States. of * 000 omitted. wheats. a