26 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



The bulk of the cold-storage business is carried on in towns and 

 cities where the Bureau of Animal Industry performs meat inspec- 

 tion, and at all of these places the inspectors in charge were re- 

 quested to apply to the owners or managers of cold-storage ware- 

 houses, whether public or private, for the information indicated by 

 the schedules. Warehouses outside of the area of the jurisdiction of 

 the inspectors were approached by mail. The services of the Bureau 

 of Animal Industry in this undertaking were performed with fidelity 

 and with as high a degree of thoroughness as the local circumstances 

 permitted. 



The schedules that were returned were placed in charge of the 

 Bureau of Statistics of this department for tabulation and the deri- 

 vation of such results as could be extracted from them. 



It appeared in the progress of the undertaking that many ware- 

 houses did not keep their records in such form as to permit the 

 making of the statements requested, or at any rate not without a 

 practically impossible amount of work. Many of the warehouse- 

 men made the reports after weeks of laborious efforts. With two 

 or three exceptions, the disposition of the warehousemen was to make 

 the reports and to give publicity to the features of their business pro- 

 vided for in the schedules. 



It may not be generally understood that cold-storage warehousemen 

 who do a public business rent space to the owners of commodities. 

 The goods stored are owned by the customers and not by the ware- 

 housemen. In private warehouses, such as are owned and used by 

 the meat Dackers, the commodities stored are owned by themselves. 



COMPILATION OF PRICES FOR 3 YEARS. 



In connection with the application to the cold-storage warehouse- 

 men for statements, several experts in the Bureau of Statistics ex- 

 hausted the resources of the library of this department and of Con- 

 gress, and the libraries of other departments, in collecting wholesale- 

 price quotations of the commodities included in the investigation. 

 The first quoted price of each month was taken as far back as Octo- 

 ber, 1880, and from that time to October, 1911. During this period 

 of 30 years grades have changed, and also the quoted grades. Error 

 due to this fact was avoided by taking prices for grades that re- 

 mained uniform from October to October of the next year, since the 

 series of 13 prices for each year, October to October, was to be con- 

 verted to index numbers based on the mean monthly price for the 

 year. The purpose of this compilation was to observe fluctuations 

 before cold storage existed or was of considerable account, and to com- 

 pare with fluctuations in recent j^ears, during which this business has 

 grown to large proportions. 



