FORTY-FOURTH ANNUAL REPORT. 143 



CO-OPERATION IN THE MICHIGAN GRAPE BELT. 



MR. HALE TENNANT^ SODUS^ MICH. 



Co-operation in the business world today is rapidly growing in favor. 

 Its great economic and social importance is being made clear through 

 extensive discussion in the public press and by educators, economists, 

 and legislators. The movement holds out much promise to the farmer 

 and there is a growing conviction among the closer students of rural 

 problems that genuine co-operation offers the only solution that goes to 

 the bottom of the American agricultural situation. 



The point of view of the farmer is gradually changing and he is slowly 

 aligning himself with the new order of things. The tremendous advances 

 in industrial organization on all sides have resulted in decided disad- 

 vantage to agricultural interests. The farmer of today begins to realize 

 that his so-called independence is a delusion and is overcoming his in- 

 heritance of individualism, scr that in the not distant future, we may 

 expect to see a great era of farm organization and with it will come im- 

 proved methods, better farming, and a richer and broader country life. 

 Then, and not until then, will arise a new order of agriculture, born of 

 the immense power of united effort and the vital and basic character of 

 the industry. 



For the first time in the history of the world, we shall see agriculture 

 taking its place among the great controlling forces of civilization. Since 

 the beginning, the farm has furnished the bone and sinews, and the 

 moral strength of nations and since the beginning it has been exploited 

 and preyed upon by the more astute and organized life of the cities, but 

 the sleeping giant of the fields is awakening. 



No upshot, however, may be expected in co-operative work. Its de- 

 velopment will be a slow evolutionary process. Grim necessity has thus 

 far been the only means that has forced the farmer to co-operate with 

 his neighbor. Enthusiasm, loyalty, altruistic motives and fraternity as 

 foundations for farm organization, have proven very unreliable and 

 much like the proverbial shifting sands. The farmer is by no means 

 sentimental when he co-operates and organizations have often found, to 

 their sorrow, that they must meet at the onset vicious competition, fight 

 all sorts of trickery and underhanded influences, and "get the money" for 

 the very first shipment, regardless of the helpless condition in which 

 the farmer may have been before the advent of the organization. "Amer- 

 ican agriculture is strewn with the wrecks of associations that were the 

 outcome of high motives and impractical enthusiasm." 



The co-operative movement in the Michigan grape belt has made con- 

 siderable progress. It is now fifteen years since the first associations 

 were, organized and notwithstanding varying degrees of success and 

 failure, a return to the old selling methods is practically impossible. 



The co-operative idea is well established and a large majority of farm- 

 ers are convinced that the selling end of their business cannot be trusted 

 to middlemen if fair returns for labor and capital may be expected. 



