646 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



ishable products into if you had wanted to. Mr. Parlier Earl, tlie 

 strawberry grower of Cobden, Illinois, was the first man to grow 

 stiawborries by fifty, seventy-five or one hundred cars, and to reach 

 out into markets furl her than Chicago, he develojjed llie lirst re- 

 frigerator car for transporting his sti-awberries. The lirst refrig- 

 erator car was fiom Cabden, Illinois, to Detroit, Michigan. So that 

 has added very much to the possibilities of a wider distribution. 



I don't know what you want me to say about peaches. I could 

 talk for a week and tell you some things, and not tell many others, 

 but there are so many phases of the question, I hardly know what to 

 touch upon, and I think perhaps after I ramble on a little while, 

 questions that may come from you will be of more value than any- 

 thing I might say. I have made some notes here, but I don't know 

 whether I Avill use them or not. 



Like all other products manufactured and cultivated and grown 

 and developed, there has grown up with the greater production of 

 peaches, and the greater consumption also, the demand for better 

 peaches, for those of finer appearance, those of large size and those 

 of better carrying quality. But there is__ still a demand, and a grow- 

 ing one, for fruits of higher quality. I grow, as I say, on a large 

 scale; perhaps larger than anybod}^ in America. I can tell the char- 

 acter almost of a community as to its culture and refinement and its 

 appreciation of high grade things if you will tell me whether 

 they buy white or yellow peaches. The demand for jdlow peaches 

 comes from a low grade desire, and that for the more beautiful, 

 delicate, and more delicious peaches from a greater appreciation 

 of the refinements of life. If you are ever going to send any peaches 

 to your best girl, never send her yellow peaches. Send her white 

 ones. There is quality and character there that is worth considering. 



To bring about high grade fruit means the selection of the right 

 varieties; means the selection of as good a soil as you can get. 

 The question of early culture in the spring, and thorough culture, 

 and no other crops growing between, are essential ; and getting the 

 trees started at the word go. The question of the tree is an import- 

 ant one. I don't know but I spoke yesterday a little slightingly of 

 the nurserymen. I didn't mean to because they are essential in our 

 business. The idea that w^e can grow our trees as well as the nurs- 

 eryman can, is a mistake. In depending on tlie nurseryman for our 

 trees, we have gone to the extent of looking for- cheap trees, and one 

 of the foundations of failure in many an orchard planting is at- 

 tempting to buy cheap trees, regardless of who grew them, where they 

 were grown, or how the}^ were grown, so the question of the cost of 

 the tree shouldn't enter into it at all, if we get the right kind of a 

 tree. The nurseryman, to meet the cheap trees we have demanded, 

 have had to grow trees as cheaply as they could. The honest nurs 

 ery-man has been distributing a great many mixed trees, withoirt 

 knowing it himself, and because you and I have wanted cheap trees. 

 The time is coming, it is here now, when some of the nurserymen 

 are selecting their buds from the best bearing trees, and there is a 

 great difference in the value of the trees. I am having it tested now 

 in some of my orchards, taking a block of some of the best Carmen 

 trees, counting the blossoms, the buds, the fruit, measuring them by 

 wdght. If you could see those figures and see the productive value 

 of one Carmen tree over another, or all the ditt'ereut varieties we 



