392 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



THE RELATION OF A CREAMERY TO ITS PATRONS. 



(Edward R. Slater, educational commissioner Blue Valley Creamery Company.) 



It is with genuine pleasure that I undertake to tell the 

 delegates to a Missouri dairy convention something about the 

 educational work that is being done by the Blue Valley Creamery 

 Company, because the grand old State t)f Missouri is the home 

 of Blue Valley. What the word "home" means to the indi- 

 vidual it means to the business organization, providing that 

 organization is made up of men who have time for the finer 

 things of life. 



Personally, I can only speak for the educational work that 

 has been carried on for the past three years, during which time 

 I have given my whole thought and attention to it. There are 

 no doubt many of you who know more about the earlier work 

 done, especially in this State, where the first dairy trains in this 

 country were run in 1904, also the first dairy congress was 

 held — the one at St. Joseph in 1906. 



The men who have guided the policies of the Blue Valley 

 Creamery Company have always appreciated the fact that the 

 foundation of the dairy industry is the dairy cow and that her 

 owner must prosper if the business as a whole is to prosper. 



An effort has been made to not only pay the farmer a high 

 price for cream, but to show him as well how to keep more and 

 better cows, how to care for them better and how to produce 

 cream of good quality. 



In order for you to gain the right impression of what has 

 been attempted it will be necessary for me to go somewhat into 

 details. 



In the first place, allow me to state that at no time has 

 our educational work supplanted work done by farmers' insti- 

 tutes, dairy schools, dairy officials and the like. It has rather 

 supplemented their work and at all times has been carried on 

 in perfect harmony with the work of these other educational 

 institutions. 



Oftentimes we are enabled to give suggestions that are 

 adopted by cream producers who might not follow the same 

 suggestions coming from other sources. We are paying them 

 cash for their product, and the close business relation existing 

 is the one thing necessary to make their minds receptive. 



We endeavor in « several ways to get practical suggestions 

 to them. They may be summed up as follows: 



