Summary of A Deal in Wheat
Characters in A Deal
in Wheat :
Sam Lewiston: The
main protagonist of the story who works as a farmer with his wife Emma in
Southern Kansas.
Emma Lewiston:
The wife of Sam Lewiston.
Hornung: The
owner of the two companies which was leading in the wheat market. He is also
called ’The Bull’.
Truslow: The
owner of one of the two companies which were leading in the wheat market. He is
also called ’The Bear’.
Mr. Gates: He is
one of the employees of Hornung.
Going: He is one
of the three employees of Hornung in the auction house named ‘The Pit'.
Merriam: He is
one of the three employees of Hornung in the auction house named 'The Pit’.
Kimbark: He is
one of the three employees of Hornung in the auction house named ’The Pit’.
Bridges: He is
the employee of Truslow who worked at the office of ‘Bridges & Co.., Grain
Dealers’
Billy: He is
Hornung’s broker.
Cyrus Ryder: He
is a detective from a famous detective agency. He was hired by Hornung.
Settings in A Deal In Wheat:
The story takes place
in Kansas where Sam and Emma live. Then the story goes to Chicago where the
dispute happens and also where Sam works as a street cleaner.
Theme in A Deal In Wheat:
This story shows how any market is controlled by the power
of money and how innocent and poor farmers are made victims of that.
Summary in one sentence of A Deal In Wheat:
The farmers and Sam become the victim of the economic
dispute between 2 major wheat selling companies which results in a price hike
and consequently affects the poor people depending on the bread line.
Detailed summary of A Deal In Wheat
The story ‘A Deal in a Wheat’ was written by
Frank Norris. Frank Norris was born in Chicago, USA. He was also a nature lover
and his writings were mostly about the effects of nature on people and how the
corruption and greediness of companies affect people. This story shows how two
companies' dispute on wheat affected the life of farmers and consequently led
to the price hike of bread affecting poor people depending on the bread line.
Once there lived a farmer named Sam Lewiston.
He had a wife named Emma Lewiston. They worked as farmers and used to grow
wheat. They used to sell their wheat to an organization named ‘Bridges &
Co.., Grain Dealers’ which was owned by Truslow.
One day they got to know that the
price of the wheat they were selling was lowered to 62 cents. They were worried
because they couldn’t afford their daily expenses by selling their wheat at
that price. So, Sam went to the office of ‘Bridges & Co.., Grain Dealers'.
There was a man named Bridges who was working there. Sam asked Bridges to raise
the price of the wheat but he was refused and instead the price was lowered
again to 62 cents. Now, he couldn’t meet his expenses anymore. He returned home
disappointed. After listening to what happened, his wife asked him to take up
the offer of moving to Chicago and working in a hat factory owned by Joe. Sam
agreed even though he did not want to leave the farm.
There were two major wheat-selling
companies. One was owned by Truslow and the other was owned by Hornung. They
were rivals in the wheat-selling market. But Hornung wanted to be the only one
selling wheat. Truslow had a low amount of stock of wheat himself. Hornung sent
one of his employees named Mr. Gates to Truslow's office to make a deal with
him. Hornung wanted Truslow to buy 100,000 bushels of wheat from him at $1.10
for profit. Truslow agreed that and said he was going abroad by taking the
wheat but he didn’t.
Hornung had three employees:
Going, Kimbark, and Merriam who worked in an auction house. They were the only
ones in the auction house who sold wheat. They were selling wheat at $1.50 a
bushel. But, one day someone else was selling the wheat in the auction house.
They were shocked because, they thought, the only one who sold wheat besides
them was abroad.
They found out that the person
selling wheat besides them was Kenneg. The three employees of Hornung bought
1000 bushels each from Kenneg. They contacted Hornung through a telegram and
asked him what to do. Then, Hornung ordered them to buy all the wheat Kenneg
had. After four hours of bidding the three employees bought 80,000 bushels of
wheat at $1.50 each. Finally, Hornung was the only one in the market who owned
all the wheat.
After their huge haul, Hornung, his
broker Billy and a detective named Cyrus Ryder from a well-known detective
agency had a gathering to discuss about the wheat they had bought from Kenneg.
The detective was there to figure out whose wheat it was and where it came
from. He had done his job as he figured out that the wheat he bought was the
wheat he sold to Truslow. Truslow had cleverly made it seem that he was moving
the wheat abroad when he was just moving the trains around Chicago. Realizing
that he was scammed he laughed and raised the price to $2 a bushel.
On the other side, Sam had
arrived in Chicago and he started working in the hat factory which was owned by
Joe. But unfortunately, the hat factory was out of business since it had too
much debt to pay, he was thrown out of that work as well. He left his wife in
her sister’s home because he had nowhere to stay. He used to sleep on park
benches.
There was a bakery named 'Vienna
bakery’ which used to give bread for free to anyone who asked in the middle of
the night. The line formed by the people who were there for the bread was
called ’the bread line’. The bread line used to be the source of Sam’s life.
And one day after Sam went there for the free bread there was a notice on the
door of ‘Vienna baker’ saying there was no bread because of the price hike. Sam
and the others were disappointed and left.
The next day Sam somehow found a street cleaning job and worked hard there. As time passed, he rose the ranks from first shift boss to deputy inspector and inspector. His salary proportionally grew to the point he could drive a red wagon. His wife also returned. He also got to know how the prices decreased and he hated the companies for that.
