146 



TWELFTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



Moved by Mr. Dittrich, delegate, of 

 Indiana, that we accept the President's 

 report, and that the Secretary be in- 

 structed to send him a letter of thanks. 



Seconded and carried. 



Vice-President's report was next in 

 order, and the following letter was 

 read by the Secretary, w^hich was re- 

 ceived from the Vice-President that 

 day stating his inability to be present. 

 The letter is as follows: 



Mr. E. B. Tyrrell, Grand Hotel, 

 Cincinnati, Ohio, 



February 10, 1913. 

 Dear Mr. Tyrrell: 



I regret exceedingly that unforeseen 

 circumstances make it impossible for 

 me to be with you at the convention. 

 Had everything ready to start this 

 morning but was unavoidably detained. 

 I hope you have a very successful 

 convention and that you will remember 

 me to the friends I expected to meet. 

 Yours truly, 



MORLEY PETTIT. 



The next in order was the Secre- 

 tary's report, which was presented, in 

 writing, and is as follows: 



Secretary's Report for Period of Time 

 Beginning January 1, 1912, and End- 

 ing February 1, 1913. 



In submitting this, my first annual 

 report to you since the adoption by 

 the National of the new Constitution, 

 I wish to thank each and every mem- 

 ber for the encouraging words and 

 liberal help that has been given me. I 

 also wish to especially thank the Sec- 

 retaries of the various Branches for 

 the kind letters sent me and for their 

 willingness to co-operate in making 

 the new plans of the National a suc- 

 cess. It is also a pleasure to thank 

 the Officers and the Oirectors of the 

 Association who have devoted untiring 

 and unselfish efforts in your behalf, 

 and it is only by the co-operation of 

 these members and officers that I have 

 been able to bring to you the encour- 

 aging report which I am here submit- 

 ting for your attention. 



On January 23, 1912, the new Direc- 

 tors to the Association met in Detroit, 

 and there considered plans for the 

 year's work. Owing to the limited 

 finances they were prevented from 

 authorizing very extensive efforts 

 being made this year. I outlined to 

 your Directors a plan for selling honey 

 in a co-operative way; the selling 



agencies to be established in several 

 important cities in the United States 

 and Canada. This plan was approved 

 by the Directors, and I fully intended 

 to put it into operation this year, but 

 circumstances, which I will mention 

 later, prevented. The Directors at that 

 meeting took up the question of fur- 

 nishing the members honey packages, 

 and I was authorized to secure the best 

 prices possible consistent with the 

 goods furnished for the members. 

 Representatives of two leading can 

 factories visited my office and sub- 

 mitted propositions. For several rea- 

 sons I finally gave the contract to the 

 National Can Company, of Dfetroit, 

 Michigan. 



I wish to say that the National Can 

 Company is an independent concern, 

 and is not the National Can Company, 

 of Baltimore, Maryland, with which 

 a great many members have it con- 

 flicted. I asked for certain specifica- 

 tions and made a contract with this 

 company to furnish us cans according 

 to the specifications named. In the 

 past bee-keepers had no way of know- 

 ing what the proper size for a full sixty 

 pound can was, and what weight of 

 tin it should be made of, and the re- 

 sult was that we found many pack- 

 ages in use that were light weight in 

 tin and short in capacity, so that they 

 did not hold the full sixty pounds of 

 honey. I also found that many ship- 

 ping cases for sixty pound cans were 

 made of thin material, and the cases 

 were badly smashed in shipping. The 

 quality of the cans furnished this year 

 has been excellent, and I have had 

 many words of praise from our custo- 

 mers. 



According to the Directors' instruc- 

 tions, I also took up the question of 

 glass packages for our members, but 

 I found that this was a subject that 

 was much harder to handle than the 

 tin packages. Glass factories do so 

 much carload business that they seem 

 to look with disfavor on the small 

 shipments. My first agreement was 

 with a glass factory, through their 

 Detroit representative, and, in a short 

 time after beginning to send the 

 orders, they refused to accept them on 

 the grounds that they were not large 

 enough. Later I made another agree- 

 ment with another factory, and in a 

 short time had a similar difficulty with 

 them, but succeeded in still getting the 

 glass packages by sending in a stock 



