Beets arriving at the factory by rail from receiving stations either are stored in bins until needed or are floated directly to the beet washers. If to be used at once, they are dumped, as shown above, and slide directly into a cement flume filled with warm water, which has been pumped to its upper end, and is flowing in the direction of the beet end of the factory. In whatever manner they may be received, they first are weighed, and as they are dumped, a basket is held under them to catch a fair sample of both beets and the loose dirt, which the car or wagon contains. These samples, properly tagged, are conveyed to the beet laboratory, where they are washed, and trimmed if not properly topped, and the difference in the weight of the sample beets as received and their weight when washed is called the “tare.” Whatever percentage this amounts to is applied to and deducted from the weight of the car or wagon load. A sample of these beets then is tested by the polariscope for its sugar content and its purity; farmers often being paid a stipulated price per ton for a beet of a given sugar content and 25 to 33¹⁄₃ cents per ton additional for each extra degree of sugar which they contain. The tare rooms and the beet-testing laboratories are open to any one, and in some localities the farmers’ associations employ experts to tare and analyze each sample of beets.] [Illustration: MILLIONS OF BUSHELS OF BEETS FACTORY BEET BINS FILLED TO CAPACITY. As they arrive by rail from receiving stations, or by team, or traction engines from the farm, beets are stored in bins or sheds, the capacity of which ranges from 6000 to 35,000 tons per factory, depending upon location and general climatic conditions. The bins are V shaped, about 3 feet wide at the bottom, 20 to 30 feet at the top, and they are 20 to 30 feet high. As beets are needed, beginning at one end of the bin the loose three-foot planks at the bottom are removed one at a time, and with hooks attached to long poles the beets are rolled into the flume or cement channel below, in which they are floated into the factory. This is not only to save labor, but to loosen up the dirt which attaches to the beets, thus partially washing them. The water which is used in the flumes is warm water from the factory.] [Illustration: TYPICAL AMERICAN BEET SUGAR FACTORY. These factories cost from half a million to three million dollars. They consume from 500 to 3,000 tons of beets per day, and during the “campaign,” which usually lasts about three months, will produce from 12 to 75 million pounds of granulated sugar. There are 73 of these factories, located in 16 States, from Ohio to California. During the operating season they give employment to from 400 to 1000 men each.] [Illustration: WASHING THE SUGAR BEETS CHEMICAL LABORATORY.