16 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY'. 



good berries offered at retail, everything going straight to Chicago unless 

 some man had a few that were too poor to ship. Those he would sell to the 

 grocers. I do not know that such things are general, but it is often so 

 here. If there could be a better understanding among grocers, this could 

 be improved, and all local markets kept full in season — then other small 

 cities taken care of, relieving Chicago and other large centers, keeping all 

 worthless fruit at home, and all our markets would improve. 



"There seem to be two things essential to success in these matters. One 

 is a better business organization among fruitgrowers, and better arrange- 

 ments with railway and express companies. If the railway companies 

 would only see this matter in the right light they might reap a much 

 greater benefit than they do at present. If each railway that runs through 

 a fruit-shipping town would run a local fruit car the length of the line, 

 they could, in the course of the season, handle an immense amount of 

 fruit; but such a course would be promptly opposed by the express 

 companies, to whom the business seems more appropriate; but they do not 

 seem inclined to treat us at all fairly. If they will pardon me for making 

 suggestions regarding their business, I would say they might make a great 

 many dollars more than they do if they would make a special fruit rate, 

 more especially from our lake towns which supply the ,great bulk of the 

 fruit. They claim to make a special rate from some of these towns; but 

 let us see what it is. From this point to Grand Bapids is 90 miles, with a 

 'special' rate on fruit. Still, it costs, as I am informed, about twice as 

 much to get a hundred pounds of fruit from here (Benton Harbor) to 

 Grand Rapids as it does from Chicago to New York. Also, they will carry 

 fruit from Chicago to Grand Kapids for less money than they will carry 

 from here to Grand Rapids, and we are exactly in the middle of the trip, 

 and their cars pass through here lightly loaded, when they might just as 

 well take on an extra car load here every day, for a hundred or more days, 

 to be distributed at Grand Raj)ids, Muskegon, Saginaw, Bay City, and 

 numerous other places, if they would only make a living rate, as they do 

 at any point where they have competition. I have never seen their tariff 

 sheets, but am reliably informed that the above state of affairs exists nearly 

 everywhere. As it now stands we can reach Grand Rapids or Saginaw 

 cheaper via Chicago and return through our own town, than any other 

 way. Now this is all wrong, and if the express companies would only look 

 at this right they could do an immense business in fruit by distributing it to 

 all towns that want it, by making a cheap fruit rate from each of the 

 principal fruit-shipping points in the state to all other points, and it need 

 not require any very expensive additions to their present train service ; and 

 as they make these smaller markets available to us, both their business and 

 ours would increase rapidly and our large crops would vanish like the dew, 

 and without loss. 



" One of the signs of the times is, that in nearly every locality where 

 fruitgrowing has become prominent, within the past three months, local 

 organizations have been formed and in the stated objects you will usually 

 find a determination to suppress fraud in packing and a return to standard 

 packages, and an effort to secure wider distribution of the product. If 

 our courage only holds out until we can remedy our own faults, we can 

 accomplish the rest, and at the meeting of this and kindred societies is the 

 place where encoiiragement should be lent to the good work, and every 

 man or woman should go from this meeting as a missionary, not to the 



