twenty men during four months, and of half that number during the remainder of the year, with the first cost of material, must be deducted from the total results, the remainder showing a handsome balance. And this is for only one cannery. Besides the two or three others, the different fisheries put up, this year, 2,000 barrels of fish.
The first drift for salmon catching was cleared in 1851, by Messrs. Hodgkins and Sanders—afterward continued by Hodgkins & Reed, now Reed & Trott—and the first canning establishment started, in 1867, by Hapgood & Hume. The buildings, erected at any of the fisheries, are of a rude character, being constructed of unplaned fir lumber. The largest are built about one hundred feet long, by twenty-five feet front, with a deep shod projecting over the river, for convenience in cleaning the fish as well as to shelter them from the sun. From the platform, extending along the side of the building, stairs run down to the water, where the boats are moored. In the lower story of this building are the vats, or "striking tubs," arranged around the sides. A commodious wharf, at which steamers and sailing vessels may receive freight, is also a necessary appendage.
There is no part of the Pacific Coast so well adapted to fish-curing as Oregon and Washington. The climate, either north or south of their latitude, is either too moist or too dry. Wood for barrels is close at hand; and, not yet utilized, close at hand, too, is the best salt in the world for curing meats of any kind. Seeing to what an immense business salmon fishing is growing, one can not help wishing that Nathaniel Wyeth, who tried so hard, in 1832, to establish a fishery on the Columbia, and failed through a combination of
