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Cornell University Library 1993.THE GRAIN
ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
READ BEFORE THE SOCIETY, MARCH 13, 1865.
BY JOSEPH DART.*
Having been invited to present to you some facts and recol-
lections in regard to the introduction of Grain Elevators at this
port, I would respectfully submit the following:
This subject has a bearing, not only on the citizens of this
community, but also upon an immensely larger number of peo-
ple, whose grain productions are sent, and whose bread supplies
are received through our hands. In fact, whatever facilitates
the movement of bread-stuffs, directly affects one of the first
interests of mankind. It might, perhaps, be said, that the ready
production of food is a question of greater importance than its
easy transportation. The first great care of men commonly, is
to produce food, not to know what to do with it when produced.
The road from hand to mouth is short and easy enough with
men at first, but as society grows, and division of labor is made,
producers and consumers of food become widely separated,
and the question of transportation becomes exceedingly impor-
tant. When the hands of producers and the mouths of con-
sumers are distant by the space of half a continent and even
* Died, September 28th, 1879, in his 81st year.392
ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
half a globe, the road from hand to mouth is a long one, and
oftentimes “a hard road to travel.” Whatever smooths the
roughness of that road cheapens food, and benefits mankind.
Some of the first inventors have devoted themselves to the
various questions which this important interest has raised. It
is somewhat noticeable that the three great mechanical minds
who gave to our country, near the commencement of the pres-
ent century, so great an impulse, not only in the leading
mechanic arts, but, also, through them, almost every material
and moral interest of the land and the world,—Fulton, Whitney
and Evans,—appear to have been chiefly useful in the three
great interests of transportation, clothing and food. To the
question of transportation, Robert Fulton directed his thoughts,
and by one stroke of success, he shortened the length of all
rivers, and the width of all seas and lakes, and brought pro-
ducers and consumers everywhere into easy and cheap com-
munication, as we see to-day in the rapidity with which grain
is hastened forward across our lakes to the waiting and hungry
East. Eli Whitney, by the invention of the “cotton gin,” made
the culture of upland cotton profitable, thus giving a new staple
to near half a continent, and greatly cheapening the fabric
most used as clothing throughout the world.
Oliver Evans, who deserves a place by the side of these distin-
guished men, was the person, who, more than any other man,
simplified and perfected the processes by which grain is con-
verted into food. Among his valuable improvements for the
manufacture of flour, were the Elevator and Conveyor, inven-
tions designed only for use in flouring mills, but which have
been adapted, by an improvement originating here, for the easy
and rapid transfer of grain in its movement towards a market.
The Elevator and Conveyor thus applied, are the simple means
by which the immense and innumerable cargoes of grain, con-
stantly arriving at this port, are readily transferred from vessels
into canal-boats or cars, and quickly sent forward on their east-
ern course. It is now in use for this purpose at all the principalELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
393
grain depots in the land, and has become absolutely essential
to the economical handling of large quantities of grain.
Before stating, as far as I can, the way in which this new
application of the Elevator came to be made, it may not be
inappropriate to present some facts in regard to the first intro-
duction of the. Elevator into mills.
Prior to 1785, the universal custom in manufacturing flour,
was to take the meal, as it came from the mill-stones, and hoist
it into the bolting room by hand. The flour was also taken
from the bolt to the drying and packing rooms in the same
way. In 1812, when there was an effort to set aside Mr. Evans’
claim, as the inventor of the Elevator, Mr. Niles, editor of
Niles Weekly Register, stated that the practice in his boyhood,
at the celebrated Brandywine mills at Wilmington, Delaware,
near which place he was born and spent his boyhood, was to
hoist the meal to the bolt, in the upper part of the building, in
large tubs, by means of a rope and pulley worked by hand.
A man was also required to feed the hopper which supplied
the bolt. In this way, every single step in the process of flour-
ing grain required separate attendance, and also involved in
the frequent handling of the flour in such cumbrous methods,
considerable loss by waste.
In 1780, Oliver Evans completed his apprenticeship and
joined his brothers, who were carrying on a small mill. He
had already shown great taste for mechanical pursuits, study-
ing by night by the light of burning shavings when refused
candles by his employer, and preparing himself, by thorough
mastery of his trade, to write, as he did some years afterwards,
“ The Young Millers Guide and Mill-wrighfs Companion” a
book which is still a standard work on the matters of which
it treats. It was not long after he commenced business, before
he had completed the several improvements in mill machinery,
on which his fame chiefly rests. Among these, as already
stated, was the Elevator, a simple apparatus with which all are
now familiar, consisting merely of a series of buckets attached394
ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
to a leather or canvas and rubber belt revolving upon pulleys.
At the time already mentioned, when the attempt was made to
break Mr. Evans’ claim as patentee of the Elevator, it was
alleged that a Mr. Stroud, a neighbor of Mr. Evans, was the
originator of it, and that it was suggested to his mind, by ob-
serving that a buckle of a band in a wheat cleaner, caught up, on
each revolution, and carried over with it a few kernels of grain.
On enquiry, however, it was ascertained that Mr. Stroud never
thought of an Elevator till Mr. Evans had talked with him on
the subject, and that Mr. Evans assured him of the possibility
of the thing, before the time when the action of the buckle on
the cleaner strap had been observed.
Another of the improvements, introduced at the same time,
was the Conveyor, for removing flour or grain in a horizontal
direction, to the point where the elevator or bolt could receive
it. Mr. Evans also contrived a very ingenious and almost
automatic process, by which the flour was kept in motion and
exposed to the air till thoroughly dry and ready for packing.
Previously the custom had been to kiln-dry the grain, making
the husk so brittle, that in grinding it became mixed with the
meal, and the small particles would pass through the superfine
bolt with the flour. By these various improvements it was
estimated that the saving, in the increased yield of superfine
flour from a given quantity of grain, amounted to fifty cents
on every barrel of flour produced.
And yet it is remarkable with what extreme difficulty Mr.
Evans brought his inventions into general use. He traveled
through Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and Virginia, offer-
ing his improvements gratis to the first party in each county who
would introduce them, and found scarcely an individual will-
ing to accept his offers. The question usually asked him was,
“ Have your neighbors, the Brandywine millers, adopted them?”
He was obliged to say “ No,” which generally finished his
prospects for securing a trial. After long importunity a dele-
gation of these millers waited on Mr. Evans, and gave himELE VA TORS OF BUFFALO.
395
their reply in the following words: “Oliver, we have had a
meeting, and agreed if thou wilt furnish all the materials, and
thy own boarding, and come thyself to set up thy machinery
in one of our mills, thee may come and try it, and if it answers
a valuable purpose we will pay thy bill; but if it does not
answer, thee must take it all out again, and leave the mill just
as thee finds it, at thine own expense.”
They knew he was too poor to comply with their terms.
When he had introduced his improvements into his own mill,
and they were working so admirably that he could tend it
easier alone than he had done before with two men and a boy,
he invited these millers to come and see his inventions work.
It happened the day they came he was engaged not only in
tending his mill alone, but also in making hay in an adjoining
clover lot. As he saw the company approaching, he quietly
withdrew to his meadow and went to work with his hay. He
thought, when his visitors went into the mill and saw it in full
operation, cleaning, grinding and bolting, and no human hand
near, they would be convinced his improvements were of some
use. They went over the mill by themselves, and then came
out to him with the request that he would go in and explain
the process. He went in with them, but took care to say it
was “ an uncommon busy day ” with him, as he had to tend
mill and make hay too. He showed them his mill, however,
and, as the account states, “ they saw that the Elevators and
Conveyors brought the meal from the two pairs of stones, and
the flour from the bolts to the apparatus called the hopper-boy,
which spread it oVer the floor, stirring, fanning and gathering
it, and attending to the bolting hoppers at the same time, with-
out the help of a single hand, in any part of the process;” and
when the inventor expected they would believe the testimony
of their own eyes, one of them exclaimed, “ It will not do, it
cannot do, it is impossible that it should do.” The delegation
went off, and reported that “ the whole contrivance was a set
of rattle traps, not worth the notice of men of common sense.”39^
ELEVA TORS OF BUFFALO.
A few years afterwards, when it was proved in Ellicott’s mills,
near Baltimore, which turned out three hundred and twenty-
five barrels of flour a day, that Mr. Evans’ improvements made
a saving of some five thousand dollars a year, in cost of attend-
ance, and of fifty cents a barrel in increased yield of superfine
flour, amounting in that one mill in a single year, to over thirty-
seven thousand dollars clear saving, the Brandywine millers con-
cluded that their neighbor’s “ set of rattle traps ” had rather an
agreeable rattle after all. But no sooner was the immense
value of these improvements manifest, than these same men
combined to destroy Mr. Evans’ claim as the patentee; and
when, after oppressive litigation, the inventor’s rights were sus-
tained, these liberal gentlemen contrived to avoid responsibility
themselves, and a comparatively poor man, whom they had
adroitly put forward, was left to pay the bill, to whom Mr.
Evans, from motives of humanity, remitted nearly half the
amount.
While Mr. Evans was struggling to introduce his Elevator,
as an improvement in the manufacture of flour, on the banks
of the Delaware, about the year 1785, he had little idea, that
at Buffalo creek, in the distant wilderness, at the foot of Lake
Erie, then without a white inhabitant on its banks, the wants
of a vast trade, at that time entirely unknown, would give rise,
some fifty years later, to a new application of his Elevator, and
that another effort would then be necessary, in order to intro-
duce it, as a commercial rather than a manufacturing appliance,
for facilitating the transhipment of grain.
In noticing this new use of the Elevator, it is worthy of re-
mark, that some of the most useful inventions have not been
discoveries of new principles or methods of mechanical action,
but new applications of methods and principles already known.
Some inventions consist of entirely new ideas. Such was Ark-
wright’s invention of spinning by rollers; a thing probably
never thought of in the history of the world, till it entered his
mind. Such were some of James Watt’s discoveries in per-ELE VA TORS OF B UFFALO.
397
fecting the steam engine. The invention of the high-pressure
steam engine by Oliver Evans, who has been styled the “Watt
of America,” was another instance of a new principle, success-
fully introduced.
But, on the other hand, Fulton’s steamboat involved no new
principle. It was only a new application of a force already
familiar. So Evans’ Elevator was an did idea. In the efforts
which were made to dispossess him of the fruits of his improve-
ments, it was successfully shown that the idea of raising substan-
ces by a revolving chain of buckets, was not original with him.
Thomas Jefferson wrote a very learned paper against Evans,
in which he quoted from ancient scientific books, showing that
this was a method of lifting which had come down from a very
remote antiquity. Travelers in Egypt had seen rude wheels
revolving on the banks of the Nile, over which passed ropes
hung with buckets, lifting water for . the irrigation of the soil.
Mr. Jefferson argued that it made no difference in principle,
that the ancient Elevators consisted of circular buckets, strung
through their centers, on a connecting rope or chain. The at-
tachment of the cups to a leather strap was not deserving a
patent, for a strip of hempen webbing would do as well. Nor
was it material, that Mr. Evans’ Elevator was used to raise
wheat and flour, rather than water; for, in that case, Mr. Jef-
ferson argued, it would require a new patent, if anyone should
use an Elevator to lift corn or peas, and should claim a sole
right to that use. It was also proven that a Mr. Martin, of
Maryland, had actually constructed, and some time used a
grain Elevator attached to a seed-planter, and consisting of a
leather strap, one and a half inches wide, armed with little
thimble-like cups, each lifting three or four kernels of seed,
and carrying them over the upper roller, eighteen inches
higher than the lower one, and dropping them regularly into
the furrow in the soil, over which the planter was drawn.
Yet the ingenuity and learning of Mr. Jefferson, and of the
wealthy millers who sought his aid, failed to invalidate Mr.ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
398
Evans’ rights as a patentee. It was justly held, that though the
Elevator was not a new idea, Evans was the first person who
had made a successful application of it to the manufacture of
.flour, and his right to the sole use of that application was sus-
tained. An inventor’s merit consists not merely in conceiving
an idea of a machine, but also in overcoming the practical diffi-
culties in its successful'operation.
Robert Fulton’s fame as a benefactor to his race is not de-
stroyed by showing that other men were before him in propel-
ling ‘boats by steam. Nearly twenty years before Fulton
succeeded, James Rumsey moved a steamboat on the Potomac,
near Sheppardstown, at the rate of five miles an hour. John
Fitch, at Philadelphia, about the same time, built a steamboat
which ran eight miles an hour. But Fitch’s power was applied
by upright paddles worked at the sides of the boat, and Rum-
sey took in a charge of water through an opening in the keel,
and shot it out again near the rudder, after the manner of a
syringe. Fulton’s application of steam to paddle-wheels was
the first practical success in this line.
In view of such facts as these, the statement is made with
some confidence, that the first practical success in handling
grain by machinery for commercial purposes, a success which
was attained in this city, was a step in advance.
It was a step in advance, because it was an entirely new use
of the Elevator. It was not new.to raise grain into a mill by
an Elevator. . This had been done from wagons, near fifty years
previous to the erection of my Elevator, in 1842-3. I am in-
formed, by our worthy townsman, Mr. John T. Noye, that, in
. 1824, his father rented a flouring mill on Bronx river, near
King’s Bridge, New York, for the manufacture of flour; attached
to which was an Elevator for the unloading of grain from
vessels, for the use of the mill. Mr. Noye thinks this mill was
erected about ten or twelve years previous to its occupation by
his father. But the commercial Elevator grew out of the wants
of the grain-shipping interests of this port.ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
399
It was not till after 1830, that grain, in any considerable
quantities, began to pass through this place to the markets of
the East; and, in 1835, at which time Ohio was the only state
sending us grain, the entire annual receipts were only one hun-
dred and twelve thousand bushels, including all kinds of grain.
From that time, however, there began to be a very rapid in-
crease, rising from half a million bushels in 1836, to near two
million bushels in 1841; an increase of four hundred per cent,
in five years. It began to be evident that there was to be a
very speedy and immense increase in the future grain business
of this port. It seemed to me, as I reflected on the amazing,
extent of the grain producing regions of the Prairie West, and
the favorable position of Buffalo for receiving their products,
that the eastward movements of grain through this port, would
soon exceed anything the boldest imagination had conceived.
The report of Hon. Samuel B. Ruggles, Chairman of the
Committee of Ways and Means, in the New York Assembly of
1838, had spoken in the most hopeful and confident terms of
the future growth of the West, and the commerce which was
destined to be carried on through this state, to and from tide-
water. and the lakes. His language was deemed, by many,
extravagant, and his ideas visionary.
A series of letters in 1839, on internal improvements and
the commerce of the West, by General Dearborn, of Massa-
chusetts, temporarily residing in this city, took the same
encouraging view.
None of these statements, however, were equal to the results
which a few years produced. Mr. Ruggles has since declared
that his predictions, which were considered as extravagant,
were considerably below his confident expectations, but that
he did not dare to put his figures as high as he felt he might,
and as time has since shown he could have done, for fear his
views would be altogether rejected as unworthy of trust. These
estimates of the growth of our inland commerce bring to mind
the remark of Mr. Burke, on the population of the American400	ELE VA TORS OF B UFFALO.
Colonies, in 1775. “State the numbers as high as we will,”,
said he, “while the debate continues, the exaggeration ends.”
It seemed very clear to me, that such an increasing trade
demanded largely increased facilities for its accommodation at
this point.
Already, with the near two million bushels received in 1841,
unavoidable delays in the transhipment at this port were fre-
quent, and were the occasion .of much vexation and expense.
Up to this time, the universal method of transfer was to raise
the grain from the hold of the vessel, in barrels, by tackle and
block, to weigh it with hopper and scales swung over the hatch-
way of the canal boat, or carry it into the warehouse in bags or
baskets, on men’s shoulders. This method, even at this present
day, is largely in use in the cities of New York, Philadelphia,
Baltimore and Boston, which illustrates the force of habit; as a
small army of men may be seen with baskets on their shoul-
ders, unloading vessels, at immense cost of muscle and time,,
to say nothing of pecuniary loss. Only ten or fifteen bushels
were commonly weighed at a draft; and the most that could be
accomplished in a day, with a full set of hands, was to transfer
some eighteen hundred or two thousand bushels, and this only
when the weather was fair. Everything was at a stand in bad
weather; and, on an average, one-fourth of the time was lost by
rain or high winds. The harbor was often crowded with ves-
sels, waiting for a change of weather. In these circumstances,
I determined, in 1841, to try steam power in the transfer of
grain for commercial purposes.
There were various obstacles to the successful execution of
such a plan, and predictions of failure were somewhat freely
expressed. I believed, however, that I could built a warehouse,
of large capacity for storage, with an adjustible Elevator and
Conveyors, to be worked by steam; and so arranged as to trans-
fer grain from vessels to boats or bins, with cheapness and dis-
patch. Amid many difficulties, discouragements and delays, I
began the work of erecting the building on Buffalo creek, at theELEVA TORS OF BUFFALO.
401
junction of the Evans’ ship canal, in the autumn of 1842, on the
spot where now stands the stately Elevator of Hon. D. S. Ben-
nett, which has risen, Phcenix-like, from the ashes of its parent.
Indeed, the building I then erected may perhaps be called the
parent, not only of the Bennett Elevator, but of all others; for
I believe it was the first steam transfer and storage Elevator in
the world. It was the first successful application of the valu-
able invention of Oliver Evans to the commercial purpose
for which it is now extensively employed. It is, however, but
justice to state, that an effort in this direction was made a short
time previous, by Mahlon Kingman, Esq., then a forwarding
merchant of this city, now deceased; and, that an Elevator
designed to be operated by horse power, was constructed, in a
warehouse previously built for ordinary storage purposes, on
the Evans’ ship canal; but I am informed by Mr. Charles W.
Evans, whose warehouse was adjoining, that Mr. Kingman
never unloaded a vessel with it, although he made the attempt.
To illustrate his opinion, that the plan was impracticable, I will
mention here, that a short time before my building was com-
pleted, Mr. Kingman, in passing it, said to me in a familiar man-
ner, tapping me on the shoulder:	“ Dart, I am sorry for you;
I have been through that mill; it won’t do; remember what I
say; Irishmen’s backs are the cheapest Elevators ever built.”
Soon after my Elevator was in operation, he came to me, about
two or three o’clock in the afternoon, to get two canal-boats
loaded that day. I reminded him of the speech he wished me
to remember. His reply was—“ Dart, I find I did not know it
all.”
My experiment, from the very first working, was a decided
and acknowledged success. Within a month after I started, a
leading forwarder, who had confidently predicted that shippers
could not afford to pay the charges of elevating by steam,
came to me and offered double rates for accommodation, but
my bins were all full. The great saving of time by the use of
the Elevator was immediately seen. To give an instance that402
ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
occurs to my mind, the schooner John B. Skinner came into*
port, with four thousand bushels of wheat, early in the after-
noon, and was discharged, received ballast of salt, and. left the
same evening; made her trip to Milan, Ohio, brought down a
second cargo and discharged it; and, on her return to Milan,,
went out in company with vessels which came in with her on
the first trip down, and which had but just succeeded in getting,
rid of their freight in the old way. In this case, the freight
work of two vessels was done by one, and instances approach-
ing this have not been uncommon. It had been said that
eight hundred bushels an hour was the extent to which an
Elevator could be driven, and grain correctly weighed. I
began with buckets twenty-eight inches apart, holding about
two quarts, and raised without difficulty a thousand bushels an
hour. I soon put the buckets some twenty-two inches apart,
and then sixteen or eighteen inches, till eighteen hundred or
two thousand bushels an hour were raised. In some of the
Elevators now in use, the buckets hold eight quarts and are only
one foot apart, and will raise six or seven thousand bushels an
hour, weighing it correctly. The storage of the first Elevator
was fifty-five thousand bushels—its capacity was doubled three’
years after.
During the twenty-two years that have now elapsed, the
rapidly increasing receipts of grain have made a demand for
continually increasing facilities for its transfer and storage, and
there are now twenty-seven Elevators, besides two floating Ele-
vators; storing, some of them, six hundred thousand bushels,,
and all together fully six million bushels, and capable of mov-
ing in a single day, more than the entire annual receipts at this
port at the time my Elevator was built. To give, at one view,
an idea of the extent to which elevating facilities have been
provided at this port, I annex a statement of all the Elevators
that have been erected here, including those that have been
destroyed by fire:*
* For valuable statistical information in this paper, relative to receipts and transhipment
of grain, I am indebted to Mr. E. H. Walker, commercial reporter of the Board of Trade
n this city.ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
403;
Elevating Warehouses.
Capac. for Storage,
bushels.
Bennett (form. Dart; burnt and rebuilt, 1863,)..600,000
Buffalo,........................ .............. 125,000
Coatsworth (transfer,).................... .. 40,000
Coburn (now C. J. Wells; burnt and rebuilt, 1863,)350,000
Corn Dock (burnt in 1865,).....................
1st City (burnt in 1859,)......................
2d City (burnt and rebuilt, 1866,)........•.... .600,000
1st Evans (burnt in 1863,).....................
2d Evans (burnt in 1864; rebuilt, 1865,).........300,000
Empire, ........................................ 200,000
Erie Basin (at Buffalo and Lake Huron Road,).200,000
Exchange,........................................200,000
Excelsior (transfer,)...........................  30,000
Floating Elevators, I and 2,..................... 30,000
Grain Dock (burnt in 1861,)....................
Hollister (burnt in 1859,).....................
Main Street (burnt in 1865; rebuilt, 1867,)......225,000
Marine (formerly Hatch,).........................200,000
Merchants',...................................... 30,000
New York & Erie (at Erie Railroad,)..............200,000
Reed (burnt in 1859,)..........................
Reed (built in 1862,)............................200,000
Richmond (new, built in 1864,)...................280,000
Sturges (burnt in 1866; rebuilt 1867,)...........350,000
Sternberg (two buildings, A and B,)..............350,000
Sterling (burnt and rebuilt, 1863,)..............150,000
Union (transfer,)................................ 40,000
Seymour & Wells,.................................125,000
Wilkeson (burnt 1863, and rebuilt,)..............280,000
Watson (built 1863,).............................600,000
Williams,......................................  150,000
Transfer Capac-
per day,bush.
96.000
96.000
50.000
96,000
i25;ooo
97.000
96.000
96.000
96.000
96.000
192,900
168.000
96.000
96.000
96,000-
144.000
100.000
96.000
c|6,ooo
96.000
96.000
96.000
288,000
96.000
Total capacity..........................5,855,000	2,700,900
The annual grain product of the partially developed Great
West, has already attained a magnitude numbered by nearly
one thousand millions of bushels, and the surplus moved
eastward by’the several routes to market, has during the last
four years, ranged from eighty to one hundred and forty mil-
lions of bushels, and of this more than one-half has been
received at Buffalo.
In 1862, about seventy millions of bushels of grain were
passed through the Elevators at Oswego and Buffalo. Thi&
large amount of grain could not have been transferred at these
points by the modes in use twenty-five years ago; and if it
were possible to do it, the expense would have been augmented
to more than twenty fold the present cost.404
ELEVATORS OF BUFFALO.
The annual saving in expense to lake commerce, by this
simple, cheap and expeditious process for handling grain, can
only be numbered by tens of millions of dollars.
The population of the Lake Basin states, has, during each
ten years of the last thirty, been augmented in a ratio equal to
fifty-five per cent. v The present population exceeds nine mil-
lions; and if a corresponding ratio of increase shall be main-
tained during the remaining portion of this century, there will
be, in the year 1900, a population of upwards of sixty millions,
in the states bordering upon and commercially tributary to the
great lakes..
The increase in the grain product of the West for the last
thirty years, has been in a ratio equal to the increase in popu-
lation. The cereal product of the West and Southwest, was,
in i860, about six hundred millions of bushels, against one
hundred and sixty-six million bushels in 1840. If this ratio of
increase shall be maintained during the remaining portion of
the century, the grain product in the year 1900, will exceed
two thousand five hundred millions of bushels. Of the surplus
over and above the wants for domestic consumption, about
fifteen per cent, has been forwarded to Eastern markets. Pro-
vided a like ratio of the surplus crop of the year 1900 is sent
to market, then there will be a movement of five hundred
millions of bushels. Not all the product of the gold mines of
California will equal the value saved to the internal commerce
of the Western and Northwestern states, by thtfse labor-sav-
ing Elevators, with only the improvements in them now in use.
Oliver Evans had a religious idea, that he was raised up by
Providence to confer important benefits on his fellow-men;
and, certainly, could he now be aware how extensively his im-
provements are used, how wonderfully, by their means, trade
has been extended, commerce increased, food cheapened, and
the general welfare of mankind advanced, he would be satisfied
that his laborious and perplexing life had not been in vain.