-S,' " - 



ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



41 i 



E. R, ROOT. 



Mr. President, Members of the Con- 

 vention: 



I believe I have not had the oppor- 

 tunity to address this Association be- 

 fore. I want to congratulate you 

 upon the fact that you are the only 

 state organization, so far as I know, 

 that has an appropriation. Certainly 

 I know of no organization that has the 

 amount you have available, $1,000 a 

 year for general work, which you get 

 from your legislature. I congratulate 

 you upon what you are doing in the 

 way of preparing exhibits and what 

 you propose to do. I congratulate you 

 further on the Legislative Committee 

 you have. 



Coming to my subiect: The time 

 was when honey was sold in a very 

 different way than it is today; it was 

 sold in a most haphazard manner, put 

 up in all kinds of ways and by all 



kinds of people, without any concep- 

 tion of the demands of the grocer or 

 the trade. 



Every bee-keeper was competing 

 with every other bee-keeper. No one 

 of them scarcely had any idea how to 

 put up honey for the retail trade. 

 Honey was sold in bulk and that was 

 proper enough. Honey was sold in 

 half ' barrels, in tin cans, and the busi- 

 ness was all right so far as it went, 

 but it was not sold in small packages. 



Some few years ago the National 

 Bee-Keepers, through another organi- 

 zation, attempted to raise funds, and 

 they did raise some, to advertise 

 honey, to popularize honey, to estab- 

 lish a trade name, but it did not suc- 

 ceed very well. 



Observing the price of honey was 

 going down right along, my associates 

 and myself said something ought to 





