510 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



cities, who are on to the job and employ special fruit men to make 

 a fine showing of their fruit. I know in New England at many gro- 

 ceries, they have fruit specialists at $25 or |3U a week who make a 

 tine display and who put out a splendid display of fruit, in order 

 to make it more attractive, and be better able to sell it to customers, 

 because its attractive beauty has first caught the eye. 



^^'e have been complaining of this gobbling up of small railroad 

 lines by richer ones, yet the consolidation of railroad lines in this 

 great country of ours has had much to do with the increased fruit 

 consumption, for by these consolidated through railroad lines, it has 

 been made possible to ship peaches into regions where they could 

 not have gone before. This is also owing to the development of the 

 refrigerator car. While it was possible in earlier days to ship 

 peaches from the Delaware Peninsula, they did not go further than 

 the fruit would bear shipping on slow trains in ventilated cars, but 

 now the market may be five hundred, one thousand, or two thousand 

 miles away, and we go there and deliver the fruit in fine order, and 

 this is owing to the invention of the refrigerator car and the con- 

 solidating of railroad lines. 



Then, the new style of packages has also had its influence in in- 

 creasing the supply and distribution of fruit, because we can now 

 ship it in crates and smaller baskets, in all sizes, which make fancy 

 looking and lighter packages, and I would say right here that fhe 

 character of our packages has also had very much to do with the 

 increased consumption of fruit. Then, also bringing about a newer 

 type of peach; peaches that are more Iiardy in their bud, and are 

 larger bearers and more resistant to the frost in the bud, are much 

 better, has htid a great deal to do v/ith the increased production, 

 and we find that tln^y are much better to ship and keep than the 

 old Persian types we had been growing; I am speaking of the North 

 ChiDa type now. So to-day, with the exception of Northern New 

 England, and the Northwestern states beyond the Lakes, we grow 

 peaches in practically every state in the Union, and I might say in 

 almost every county. That is a little bit strong, but I can say that 

 there is not specially a particular region where they cannot be 

 grown to a greater or less degree of success, and it is not necessary 

 to go off your farm or certainly not out of your township to grovi* 

 peaches of one or more varieties, if you desire to grow them. And 

 these are the reasons that we have "the peach season" six months 

 of t!ie year, instead of three or four weeks, as heretofore. 



Now, wiiat are the essentials to successful peach growing? It 

 strikes me, after a life's work in the cultivation of the peach, study- 

 ing the conditions of my fellow man, together with the market con- 

 ditions, and all other things, that would help to stimulate peach 

 growing, I have come to the conclusion that the best foundation 

 for success, lies in the man or woman who has taken up the job. 

 I find men and women succeeding in many localities, and their neigh- 

 bors falling by the wayside, although the conditions are the same 

 with both. I find that everywhere; so it seems to me, the first thing 

 is the man. Life is pretty short and pretty sweet to most of us, and 

 I think most of us ought to be doing something we like all the time. 

 I don't mean to be on a jag all the time. I don't believe we should 

 get up every morning and go out to something, that is our life work, 

 that is distasteful to us. I believe there is something for every man 



