STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. IO5 



common people, the working people, sell to them at a reasonable 

 price. You simply cannot do it if you put them in boxes. 

 There are advantages in the box, of course — it is handier. You 

 can buy a box and take the fruit home. The bushel basket with 

 a cover is a better package. You can sell the fruit more nearly 

 at a price that common people, average people — not those who 

 live in luxury — can afiford to pay. And so at our Station, and 

 Cornell has joined in the effort, too, in New York, we are now 

 trying to tell our apple growers to cut the expense every way 

 possible and yet grow a big crop of apples, give a fair, honest 

 pack, accept a price that will remunerate them and give them a 

 fair profit, distribute them as generally as possible, and get 

 everybody in the United States to eating apples at a price they 

 can afford. Now you can't do that with box apples, although, 

 of course, you will understand there is a certain demand for 

 box apples, and if you have the stuff to put in boxes it is up to 

 you to get the high prices that have been mentioned here. 



Mr. : It seems to me we should have some smaller 



package in addition to the barrel. For instance, take our Mc- 

 intosh Red and put it into a barrel ; you are going to bruise a 

 good many of them. It is not a barrel apple to my mind at all. 



Prof. Hedrick : Our growers are shipping a great many 

 apples in the bushel basket and it is a good package, putting a 

 peg in the center of the basket so the cover rests not only on 

 the sides but on this peg in the center. They ship a great many 

 apples from the Hudson and some from Western New York, 

 and a great many people in Michigan. Tremendous quantities 

 of peaches are shipped in bushel baskets. It will answer all the 

 purposes of the box, so far as a small package is concerned. 



Question : What about the peach basket ? 



Prof. Hedrick : I should think they might well be packed 

 in peach baskets, — the Mcintosh, fancy products. It would 

 take less trouble to pack a peach basket than a box. It is not 

 an easy job, as any one knows who has tried it several times, 

 to pack a box of apples and do it decently. It is an expensive 

 operation and it takes too much time, and only the fancy trade 

 can take those apples. Please don't think I am trying to dis- 

 courage the selling of apples in boxes, if you have the box 

 stuff and want to put it up that way, but I should be sorry to 

 see all the apples boxed, because it would mean that none but 

 wealthy people could buy and eat apples, and that is wrong. 



