Vermont Dairymen's Association. 115 



HOW WE CAN BRING ABOUT COOPERATION OF THE 

 DAIRYMEN WITH THE CREAMERYMEN. 



W. N. GIIvFlLLAN, SOUTH RYIvGATE, VT. 



I cannot tell yon much yon do not know already ; but if I 

 can say a word that will help in the great matter of cooperation 

 in dairying I shall be glad to do it. Thirty years or more ago 

 when the Board of Agriculture came to Ryegate, which by the 

 way was settled largely by Scotchmen, and began to tell us 

 of creameries and cooperative dairying, some of our people 

 were slow to believe it. The Board was about the first to sug- 

 gest to us that cooperation in dairying had advantages over 

 private dairying, and our people were decidedly skeptical. I 

 doubt not that the Board came to the conclusion that Ryegate 

 would be one of the last towns to accept and adopt cooperative 

 dairying; and, yet strange to say, 12 years ago there was a sudden 

 overturn and four creameries were organized and set to work 

 in Ryegate. Well, of course, we were near neighbors. There was 

 some competition. The Scotchman is anxious to get all that 

 bcongs to him, you know, and we had quite a time of it. In fact, 

 the conditions were not what we could wish, — sometimes we co- 

 operated and sometimes we didn't. As a gentleman in an adjoin- 

 ing town where they started a creamery said when asked how 

 they were getting along, "half of them are mad all the time." 



We have been helped in our work, however. We have suc- 

 ceeded in our dairying and this success has come about, in part 

 at least, because of this help all along the line. The board of 

 Agriculture aided. We grew to like the members of the Board, 

 to have them come to us as often as possible ; and they all said 

 that they liked to come. The cattle commission was of assistance. 

 W^e gladly welcomed the commission. We took the matter of 

 tuberculosis in hand vigorously in our town, and there are more 

 cows tested in Ryegate than in anv other town of Veniont except 

 Randolph. And we are glad to know that we had very little of 

 the trouble. The Experiment Station helped. We had to call upon 

 the Experiment Station to help us in doing our work from time 

 to time and it never failed us. We have sent samples over here 

 to get help in testing. We have had some of their young men 



