WTtAT OTHERS SAY. 467 



OUTCOME OF THE FRUIT SHOW. 



It would not surprise us at all, indeed it is one of the things we 

 confidently expect and predict, that consequent upon the great show 'of 

 fruit now on exhibition at the St. Louis Exposition, within five years, 

 trains of special cars will be loaded in Southern Missouri and the fruit 

 go direct to the seaboard, and thence to Europe in the original pack- 

 ages. We have demonstrated beyond the shadow of a doubt that Mis- 

 souri is in the centre of the "fruit belt," that here soil and climate are 

 unsurpassed, and that in no other state can the same quantity and qual- 

 ity be periodically produced . These incontrovertible facts will add to 

 the number and size of our commercial orchards, give zest to the ge- 

 nius and the enterprise of the orchardist in competing for the production 

 of the best, and create a demand for our fruit from all parts of our own 

 country and from Europe. 



This is no wild fancy of a visionary brain. It is a cold statement 

 based upon bare facts. The evidence is here before our eyes, and see- 

 ing is believing. 



Here w^e have five hundred and twenty varieties of apples shown 

 on three thousand different plates, the show kept up forty days in 

 succession, and yet two-thirds of the state are not represented. It is 

 mainly the result of individual enterprise in which not more than a dozen 

 local horticultural societies take part. The state gives it no aid and the 

 railroads no help as they do in Arkansas and Kansas; it is therefore the 

 outcome of the energy and the enterprise of earnest men who, knowing 

 their business, have the most implicit confidence in the result when op- 

 portunity is afforded them of open competition with the world. 



Missouri horticulturists owe a debt of gratitude to J. C. Evans 

 and L. A. Goodman, president and secretary, respectively, of the State 

 Horticultural Society, for the long and arduous work involved in bring- 

 ing the show to perfection, and the self-denying manner in which they 

 have personally superintended all the arrangements and remained with 

 it from the begmning. To D. S Holman, the efficient treasurer, who also 

 has personally remained with and assisted them, similar credit is due. 

 There are other enterprising men whose names might be mentioned in 

 this connection, men who assisted in furnishing the fruit, in collecting, 

 picking and shipping it, and at times being present here spending time 



