Sevejstty-Tiiikd Anxuat. Report 1175 



elation, liowovcr, has resulted iii iiiakiiiii' prices In tlitJ lueal stures 

 more fixed, and In causing them to be much more enterprising than 

 before; because now in each small village they have competition, 

 which tliej did not have before. I wish to repeat, however, that 

 in a purely agricultural community, I think it is essential for the 

 success of a cooperative association that every member should 

 give all of his business to the association. A cooperative asso- 

 ciation, pure and simple, must control all the business of its 

 members in order to succeed ; and no member should permit him- 

 self to l)e tempted from this policy. Many of such enterprises 

 have split upon precisely this rock. It may justly be said that this 

 is the very first condition of success in cooperating. It has taken 

 three years to put the supply business of Bedford Farmers' Co- 

 operative Association fairly upon its feet, because of the absence 

 of this feature. 



The other side of our work — • what I call the constructive side 

 — is an effort upon which we have entered to restore successful 

 apple culture to Westchester County. It is a natural fruit region, 

 as anyone can see who drives along the highways, but the old 

 orchards have been neglected, and are rapidly dying where they 

 are not already dead. Bedford Farmers' Cooperative Associa- 

 tion, in view of this situation, has thought that it could render 

 no better service to our neighborhood than to try to restore apple 

 culture to Westchester County on terms that will enable it to 

 compete with the best producing regions of the United States. To 

 this end the association -has employed an apple expert, whose 

 advice is available for all its members. This last year, the asso- 

 ciation has taken care, in whole or in part, of twenty-one apple 

 orchards in a region ten miles square ; and it has erected the 

 apple evaporator and vinegar plant of which I have spoken, in 

 order to lie able to make use of the poorer qualities of fruit, while 

 the best quality is being slowly developed. It will doubtless take 

 three years, and perhaps more, to put this part of our business 

 on a self-sustaining basis. The present year has been a singularly 

 hard one in which to begin, for the apple crop in the Harlem 

 Valley was hardly more than a tenth of a crop, while very low 

 prices have prevailed for apples by reason of the very large crop 

 produced in the country as a whole. This sort of service to the 



