WINTER MEETING AT CARTHAGE. 133 



THE RESULT OF WORK. 



We are happy to-day to come before you with such a successful 

 showing- as we can now present of our work during the last ten years* 

 As stated in the report made in this place then, "all that was needed 

 was the united action of our horticulturists-' to accomplish just what 

 jou now see all over the State. I claim to be only one to help to do 

 this work, and the success is not my pride only, but that of every mem- 

 ber of the Society who have so fully and nobly j?iven their best efforts 

 to this grand work. As a result of this we have seen hundreds and 

 thousands of good people settle in our midst, bringing riches and honor 

 to our State. It has taken some time to awaken an interest in this 

 matter, but it is at hand, and the honor belongs to our own Society and 

 its members and officers. 



I wish I might be able to tell you of the growth in tree-planting 

 all over our State during the last three years. But our nurserymen 

 could give some wonderful figures if they were only combined ; suffi- 

 cient is it to say that hundreds of thousands of acres and millions of 

 trees have been planted to the apple, the king of fruits, and to the lus- 

 cious peach. Our nurseries have been cleaned of all apple and peach 

 trees, and the cry has been for more and more. To-day you will see 

 thousands of new, young, thrifty orchards dotting our hills and moun- 

 tains all over our land as the work of the Society. 



OUR EXHIBITS. 



During the last ten years we have brought our Society to the notice 

 it deserves, and our fruits before the buyers of the country. Exhibits 

 have been made at the World's Fair at ^ew Orleans, where we cap- 

 tured more premiums than any other State in the Union ; another at 

 Philadelphia, Pa., at Grand Rapids, Mich., at Rochester, if. Y., at Bos- 

 ten, Mass , three at St. Louis, Mo., and in every instance we have taken 

 first place among them. 



We have had a fine collection of fruits at every one of our State 

 meetings, and I have taken them to scatter over the other states at 

 their horticultural meetings, thus bringing into the State hundreds of 

 earnest fruit-growers, so that we can say, and not boastingly, "that the 

 State Society has been the means of locating more good citizens and 

 bringing more good money into the State than any or all other means 

 combined." 



Only the other day at Olden, in South Missouri, I met eight per- 

 sons from Minnesota, four from Iowa, three from Nebraska, five from 

 Kansas, two from Illinois, one from Ohio, all looking for fruit farms, 

 and all learning of the State through our Society work. There is no 

 need of discouragement, is there I 



