RISE OF COMMERCIAL CULTURE 55 



trains arrived in the market late. The success of the 

 enterprise then, as now, depended upon getting the berries 

 into market in time for the early morning trade. Berries 

 shipped in ventilator cars which arrived late in the morn- 

 ing could not be held in good condition until the market 

 of the following morning. The Horticulturist for 1871 

 reported : " An hour's difference in the arrival of a fruit 

 train is sufficient to cause a decline in the price of 5 to 10 

 cents a quart upon all the fruit it carries. Upon one train 

 which was carried over the Delaware Road this spring there 

 were 256,000 quarts. The total loss to the growers by the 

 arrival of this train one hour late was between $10,000 and 

 S20,000."i "The most discouraging period in the 

 history of the berry business that I can recall," says A. 

 W. Slaymaker of Delaware, "was when the report came 

 back regularly, on our biggest days, that the train got in 

 too late for the market. I can only faintly depict the dis- 

 appointment to hundreds of hard working growers who 

 found their labors all in vain." ^ Between 1870 and 1880 

 the losses, from shipping long distances in ventilator cars, 

 were very heavy. By 1880 there was a decided decrease 

 in planting at points distant from the large markets, es- 

 pecially in the South ; the risks were too great. At this 

 juncture, the refrigerator car came into use, and gave 

 greater security to the business. The railroad, telegraph 

 and refrigerator car are a trio of facilities that have made 

 commercial strawberry-growing continental instead of 

 local. 



The introduction of the refrigerator car. — The pioneer in 

 strawberry refrigeration was Parker Earle, of Cobden, 

 Illinois. In the face of the skepticism of growers and the 



1 The Horticulturist, 1871, p. 226. 



2 Kept. Peninsula Hort. Soc, 1905, p. 68. 



