From Wikipedia:
Sorry, sugar beets are nasty.
Sugar cane is magnificent, but it requires very special conditions to grow.
-Photograph by Kevin Parson
Cane sugar is awesome. I do not recall ever seeing a premium food product proclaim it was made with “pure beet sugar”, but “pure cane sugar”, that is something worth proclaiming.
-Kevin
Its been a while since I visited my own thread about tank cars and molasses. I do appreciate the discussion about molasses.
As Kevin may know, part of my interest in the topic is spawned by the sugar cane industry in Florida. US Sugar has a large operation south of lake Okeechobee. In our last family visit, I went to Clewiston to fan the US Sugar plant and the surrounding trains. It wasn’t harvest season, so their wasn’t a lot of activity that I could get close too.
Large cuts of tank cars are run out of Clewiston. A lot of them carrying liquid sugar too. I think granulated sugar gets hauled from there too. Covered hoppers. Also, its my understanding that in modern times, molasses is hauled in black tank cars and liquid sugar (generally) in white tank cars, for obvious reasons.
I think in 1975, tank cars were the predominant means to haul molassess (not just from Florida), but I also think it was the beginning of a transition to larger cars. My real question is what was the type of tank car? Were the older in the tooth 11,000 gallon cars being used or did the newer bigger cars get molassess service. Maybe a combo of both, or other types?