Missouri State Dairy Association. 405 



practically nothing. Now the creamery is distributing $50,000 

 annually to the farmers around Mountain Grove. This is 

 quite an item when we consider that in that locality the labor 

 is practically all the additional investment the farmers have made 

 in order to produce the cream. It is not out of place to mention 

 here that this same creamery is responsible for the statement 

 that the production of cream in the Missouri Ozark region is 

 increasing at the rate of 150 per cent a year. 



Here again it might be interesting to note from the purely 

 financial point of view what certain individuals have accom- 

 plished. Mr. John Hosmer, whose farm has already been 

 referred to because of the wonderful increase in its soil fertility, 

 furnishes a still more interesting story about what income can 

 be obtained from a large and properly managed dairy farm. 

 His farm contains 670 acres. He milks 100 cows. Butter is 

 made on the farm so the skim milk and buttermilk is available 

 for hog feeding. Mr. John Hosmer, son of the man who started 

 the farm, is as thorough a business man as was his father. He 

 takes an annual invoice and knows accurately what his whole 

 farm as well as his individual cows are doing. He keeps no 

 cows that do not produce on the average a pound of butter a 

 day. At the end of his last fiscal year he cleared above all 

 expenses a little over $7,000. One interesting thing about Mr. 

 Hosmer is that he is an influence in his community. Practically 

 all of his neighbors are dairying, and needless to say, are dairying 

 successfully. He has supplied breeding animals to hundreds of 

 farmers in that locality. 



Several years ago a relatively poor man went to Billings, 

 Mo., from St. Louis. He was driven to the country because 

 of poor health. He bought a hillside farm and a few cows. 

 Inside of five years he has paid for the farm, increased the pro- 

 duction of his cows to an average of 300 pounds of fat a year 

 and has grown five tons of alfalfa to the acre. All of it has 

 been due to the influence of the dairy cow. 



According to the United States census figures there are 

 850,000 dairy cows in Missouri. Basing an estimate of the 

 milk and cream used on the farms, the per capita consumption 

 in the cities and giving the skim milk a value of 20 per hun- 

 dredweight, which is conservative and fair, we make the total 

 value of dairy products of Missouri in round numbers $32,- 

 000,000. This compares very favorably with the $33,000,000 

 value of the poultry products of the State estimated on the 



