milling companies sell wheat. It is the business of the
exporters to make shipment to other countries. Wheat is sold to
exporters and millers by the elevator companies, who are interested in
running as much grain as possible through their elevators at country
points. The chief business of independent dealers is to handle wheat
that stands "on track," ready for shipment, either buying outright from
the farmer or handling it for him on a commission basis.

The "commission man" is in an especially good position to do a
clean-cut business. He assumes no burden of large capital investment
and operating expense, as do the elevator companies. His chief need is
a line of credit at a bank and from this he pays advances to his
clients, his security being the bills of lading of wheat consigned to
him. He does not need to buy or sell on his own account and, unlike
the exporter, he does not have to risk changes in freight rates or in
prices or make deliveries by given dates. As for the satisfactory
milling quality of the crop--that is something for the miller to worry
over. In order to do business it is necessary only for the commission
man to be a member of the exchange and to obey its rules.

For a long time Winnipeg has been known as the greatest primary wheat
market in the world. That means that a greater volume of new wheat,
direct from the producer, passes through the Winnipeg market than
anywhere else, not even excepting Chicago where the first grain
exchange to reach international development was established in 1848.
The Winnipeg market is fed by the vast wheat area of Western Canada and
frequently between two and three million bushels of wheat go through
Winnipeg in a single day. During the rush season sixty or seventy cars
of wheat leave Winnipeg for the East every twenty minutes of every
twenty-four hours. The freight boats on the lakes load 460,000 bushels
in three-and-a-half hours.[1]

It is interesting to note that nowhere else in the world is a great
public grain market like the Winnipeg market found located four hundred
miles away from the storage point where grain dealt in is kept for sale
delivery. Geographically Fort William and Port Arthur at the head of
the great lakes water route would provide the natural delivery point
for Western grain which has been routed eastward[2] and there the
location of the exchange might be looked for logically. It so happens,
however, that the eastern edge of the vast