260
Modern Business Geography
ing. Another type consists of the manufacture of imported raw ma-
terials, such as sugar, spices, coffee, and silk goods. Oakland is es-
pecially important for lumber products from lumber cut in the Sierra
Nevada Mountains on the east or brought from Washington and
Oregon by boat.
Aside from the universal industries and the canning factories, Los
Angeles has two great industries. - One is the refining of oil the supply
of which comes from the California oil fields, shown in figure 102 (page
129). The other is unique, because Los Angeles is by far the greatest
center of the motion picture industry. Scenes pictured there are shown
daily to audiences in almost every country of the world. Several
geographical factors combine to produce this result. (1) First comes
the climate, with its clear sunny skies at all seasons, and its absence
of extremes of either heat or cold. (2) The mountains furnish splendid
scenery close to the great city. (3) Not far away the ocean with its
fine surf and picturesque islands supplies the scenery for plays of an-
other type. (4) And lastly the vegetation varies greatly. Tracts of
desert bushes occupy the low, dry plains, wonderful orchards of oranges
and other fruits interspersed with rich gardens and grain fields are
found in the irrigated areas; while open forests of live oak cover the
lower slopes of the mountains and denser pine forests abound higher up.
To the stranger who has the privilege of seeing how motion pictures are
made, Los Angeles seems like a city in wonderland, but to the players
it 1s a place where a great industry has its home.
CANADIAN SECTION OF THE NORTH AMERICAN MANUFACTURING AREA
The manufacturing region of southeastern Canada is practically a
continuation of that of the eastern United States. Toronto, as may
be seen in Figure 162, lies almost in the area of intensive manufactur-
ing, while Montreal is an outlier like Minneapolis and St. Paul. These
places draw coal, iron, raw cotton, rubber, sugar, and wool from a
distance, and convert them into manufactured goods that are sold all
over Canada. Other cities, such as Quebec, Winnipeg, and Vancou-
ver, supply local demands.
Nevertheless, most of the manufacturing of Canada consists of
relatively simple operations, such as sawing boards and shingles, mak-
ing wood pulp, canning fish, and making butter and cheese. Like
such states as Maine, Minnesota, Tennessee, and Arizona, most of
Canada relies on the northeastern United States and England for a
large part of its more complex manufactured goods, and devotes its
energies chiefly to taking care of its natural resources.
