336 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



This year it is expected that the association will meet at Cham- 

 paign, Illinois, and an effort will be made to get together the other 

 side and try to bring together the men interested in live stock. Now 

 this association is not organized simply for the purpose of studying 

 the process of breeding, but to study the propagation of pedigreed 

 animals and pedigreed plants. 



We have hardly waked up to the size of this subject from an 

 economic standpoint, but the scientific side of getting at the facts 

 concerning heredity is steadily coming forward since the work of 

 Mendel w^as made public, and there are many now following up his 

 method of investigation. 



The American Breeders' Association was organized under a con- 

 stitution that provides for changing the constitution by vote of all 

 the members by mail after the annual meeting of the association 

 has put the question up to the members. I might say it has a good, 

 broad, general constitution. The officers are Secretary Wilson, who 

 is president; L. H. Kerrick, of Illinois, is vice president; F. B. 

 Mumford, of Missouri, is president of the animal section ; and Prof. 

 N. E. Hanson, of South Dakota, is at the head of the plant breeding 

 section, and I am the secretary. The committees that have been pro- 

 jected for this association have not yet been appointed. As to 

 membership, it is proposed to get membership from individuals at 

 one dollar per year, life membership is given to individuals for $20, 

 and associations are given membership for $20 to run twenty-five 

 years. At the recent meeting of the American Association of Agri- 

 cultural Colleges and Experiment Stations a resolution was passed 

 advising all the agricultural experiment stations and agricultural 

 colleges to take life memberships. Life memberships form a per- 

 manent investment fund. 



The time is coming when experiment stations will produce new 

 varieties of fruits, grains and vegetables that will have a greater 

 value than those now produced, they will bring a higher price on 

 the market, and this is the only way to spread them rapidly and 

 bring them before the people. This is a great deal better than the 

 fre« seed distribution, into which enough money is being put to 

 create a fund to carry on this experimental work of improvement 

 in plants and animals. This organization proposes to work with the 

 government of the United States and with the states to promote this 

 work in any organization. 



It is the desire to have the agricultural colleges, experiment 

 stations, live stock associations and all similar organizations become 

 members, and I am here to invite you, ladies and gentlemen, as a 



