Winter Meeting. 195 



farm as stock feed or worked up as first stated. Anyone that has noticed 

 the condition of the market in St. Louis could easily see that thousands 

 of dollars each day were being lost by some one; the average cost price 

 of apples from along our line (and we pack at fourteen different points) 

 laid dotvn in St. Louis cost from $1.80 to $2.25 per barrel. We all know 

 now and we knew it then that somebody was being hurt and hurt bad. 

 It is a well known fact that thousands upon thousands of barrels of 

 apples were sold on St. Louis market at 75 cents and up to, in some 

 cases, fancy prices. But where is the remedy and what will our soci- 

 ety say and do to prevent a repetition and forestall such disastrous re- 

 sults ? Some may say I sold my fruit for good prices and I worked off 

 culls and !N"o. 2's. Yes, that is true in many cases and no doubt these 

 men would have felt good for the time being if they had filled 

 the barrels with small limbs and roots from the trees as long as they 

 could get them. The strawberry men are taking the correct course to 

 avoid a repetition of what happened to their trade last spring, and it is 

 not too much to hope that from the experience of the apple year now 

 drawing to a close and out of the disaster that has overtaken so many, 

 v/ays and means may be devised to correct the abuses that have crept 

 into the trade. I speak from the standpoint of a grower as well as a 

 buyer, packer and shipper; I have had forty years or more experience 

 in the apple trade and never but once have I experienced such a year as 

 the one now closing. But there is one fact that must not be lost sight 

 of, when buyers go in the market bucking against a supposed short 

 crop nine times out of ten it will go against them. But I will leave 

 this subject to the consideration of the society, hoping something may 

 grow out of these crude and hastily prepared suggestions. 



Friends and fellow workers : 



I regret much my inability to meet with you, as this should be 

 one of the most profitable and interesting meetings ever held by our 

 society. First the Paris, France, exposition next year, while our ex- 

 hibit will not be a large one, yet I have every reason to believe it will 

 be a fine one while it lasts ; after this comes the Pan-American exposi- 

 tion at Buffalo, iSTew York, in 1901, and it is not too early to commence 

 preparing for it. At that exposition, as the boys say, we will have a hot 



