362 AGRICULTURE OF MAINE. 



of our creamery and the price of milk depends on where they 

 are located. When we started, more than thirty years ago, at 

 Turner Center, we were going to hire a collector to go up, 

 across, down, and back to the creamery. One man said, "It is 

 not more than a quarter of a mile to my house ; must I share 

 equally with all these other fellows?" The president said, 

 "Why, yes; it costs more to get yoair cream, because the man 

 has to harness his horse to get it, and then it does not cost much 

 to go to the next man, etc." Probably the business we are doing 

 can be financed and operated and carried on — we will assume 

 that it could — more profitably than a small business, so that you 

 who live close to the creamery are purposing to cooperate, by 

 dividing with the others who live farther away. You get a 

 little benefit from their product. Let us suppose that two or 

 three farmers come down from Buckfield, Sumner, etc., and 

 went to one of the store keepers here to sell his product, he 

 would have to travel around quite a little, and then they would 

 turn him off, because others were coming. How easy it is now ; 

 you do not start out with a box of butter to see how much you 

 can get for it. Everyone is used alike in the factory. It is all 

 right, too. Are not we accomplishing, directly, what you are 

 looking for and longing for — the farmer to make his own 

 price? You do not expect any individual to make his own 

 price, but hire someone to sell the product and he make the 

 price. I feel that it is all right to give the fellow at a distance 

 all that you can ; it is good to bring him in with the rest. 



Question : How miuch have you averaged, the past year, 

 paying for milk ? 



Answer: Wasn't it 40 cents per hundred weight for 1914? 

 I want it understood that the hundred weight takes in the butter- 

 fat again; that we are paying a certain number of cents for 

 butter-fat, and the price of milk, say 50 ceaits, at the present 

 time, you are getting butter-fat added to the price per hundred 

 weight. Why do we do that? Why do we not separate the 

 butter-fat from the skim-milk? It is too much work, and would 

 not pay. 



Question : I think you have your average for the year 

 very high. Now you are paying us high, but in summer the 

 pay is low. What are you getting for skim-niilk now ? 



