PROCEEDINGS CORN BELT MEAT PRODUCERS' ASSN. 465 



don't want to take the time— and we started to put one shipping associa- 

 tion on contract. They were all Irish, too, every one of them. And then 

 we went from that to another town right in the same community, and 

 we got an outlet for that bunch of Irishmen — got a local outlet, that paid 

 just as good as the other fellow had been paying the stock buyer. And 

 then we got another town, and then got one county, and then we 

 kept right on getting more of them until finally we got so many of them 

 that there was a sort of a packing plant up there began to wire in and 

 wanted to know where all the hogs were going to — he wasn't getting 

 them. And we got enough of them so that he had to buy hogs elsewhere, 

 and today that shipping association is going good. We are giving the 

 same prices and service, absolutely, that the stock buyer used to give, 

 and we have checked up on our records and they are getting stronger all 

 the time. That is a big piece of work, men. We can not get anywhere 

 unless we do get the market. I have seen the thing tried out, time and 

 time again, and usually the stock buyer has the local market, and the 

 shipping association has got to go to Chicago, and the stock buyer will 

 equal them. Usually that is the case, not always. We have been open- 

 ing up that market, and when we open that up, we will open three or four 

 more right in the same neck of the woods. We are now getting in, as 1 

 told you in the first place, down at Ottumwa. The other day I got two 

 shipping associations in Cedar Rapids. You can all have the market if 

 you get the volume of business back home first. That is all. Those fel- 

 lows want the stuff, and they are willing to pay for it, if you have got 

 the stuff to sell. If you haven't got the stuff to sell, they are going to 

 buy from the fellow who has it. It is up to us to get out and get the 

 business, and it is no piker's job. Fellows tell me, "You get me the 

 market, and then I will build a shipping association." I am forced to 

 state, "Let us so build our shipping association that the packers will give 

 us the market." 



There are a lot of just such things I would like to talk to you about. 

 I would like to tell you more of the state organization, but I don't feel 

 like taking more time. I believe I have just said enough, so that you 

 all have an inkling of what the situation is in the field. The remedy is 

 reorganization under that plan; and then after we have done enough of it 

 so that we can say that the plan is possible, it is workable. We have 

 over one hundred and fifty shipping associations under this plan. Not 

 all of them have been successful, because no matter how many meetings 

 we have to get the farmers in and get them to sign, you are nearly 

 always going to have the same bunch of men back every time, and the 

 only way you are ever going to get the other fellow is to drive right out 

 to his farm and get him out back of the barn or woodshed and sit down 

 and talk this thing clear through from beginning to end, so he will under- 

 stand the whole proposition, and then ask him to sign. And, do you 

 know, in ninety per cent of the cases, they sign. That is one of the 

 things I have learned in traveling around to these places. When we 

 come to town we meet some of the directors and managers and they will 

 sit down and tell us their problems — here is this, that and something else, 

 and so forth; and then we tell them how we think they can handle that, 

 and they will scratch their heads and say, "That is all right, that is a 



