Feb. 25, 1904. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



145 



plenty of others who were very much interested in bees, and 

 in fact, I know of two or three ladies who arc "ow keepnig 

 bees, after visiting my yard ; and I think that 1 imparted some 

 information in regard to the use of extracted honey, and I 

 sold nearly all of mine granulated to that class of people after 

 they had been to the yard and saw what I was doing. 



Mr. Wilcox— I thought at first that I would not say any- 

 thing on this subject, because I am more anxious to hear 

 what others think. I have wanted to know this a long time, 

 1 have had this subject on my mind for about lo years. 

 1 was here, as you know, at the Columbian Exposition, m 

 charge of the Wisconsin State honey exhibit, and I mi.ght 

 say this at the outset, as Mr. Root has stated, the chief ad- 

 vantages are the educational advantages. It pays in almost 

 any industry to educate people, in bee-keeping especially. It 

 is the one thing that we need most. We are not educatmg 

 the people by making exhibits, if we simply go and place 

 our exhibit there in proper position, as attractive as we can, 

 and go away and leave it. Thousands of visitors will pass it 

 daily and never know that they have seen anything. Some, 

 perhaps, are so well acquainted that they will know it is 

 honey; others will see it and say it is prettv, or not pretty, 

 and go on. But if there is someone there to answer any 

 question that may be asked concerning the production or use 

 of the honey, then there is information given that does some- 

 body some good, and continues to spread, and as you con- 

 tinue going there from morning to night, day after day, 

 through the season, you have done a great work, and that 

 work tells for years to come. It is certainly a benefit, and in 

 this respect I might say that there is just the same benefit 

 in exhibiting honey at fairs that there is in exhibiting grains, 

 butter and cheese, and vegetables, live stock, or any other 

 commodity: they all do it for a purpose, to show to the people 

 what others have done that they may do ; it advertises, and 

 in many ways builds up trade. It promotes commerce and 

 production. It promotes consumption. It is promoting busi- 

 ness. If it is properly done, it is profitable; if it is improperly 

 done, it is a waste of means. 



Mr. Smith — I wish just to state that I made exhibits at 

 the Illinois State fair several times. Mr. York will remem- 

 ber he was judge at one time when I had an exhibit, and 

 I made the first exhibit of section honey at the Illinois State 

 fair that was ever made. We had sections there which dove- 

 tailed. There were four pieces, and we would stick them 

 together, and the people wanted to know how the bees knew 

 there was a pound of the honey in them ! Three years ago 

 I had a miniature mill, representing an old-fashioned water- 

 mill. I had a full sheet of brood-comb ; then I had a stream 

 of liquid honey running from back of a curtain, through a 

 wax trough down into the mill, that turned the wheel, and 

 people would come along and see that, and say, "Are the bees 

 making that honey as fast as it comes out of the mill?" They 

 would ask all kinds of questions, and I had an extractor there, 

 and was extracting, and every once in a while we would ex- 

 tract, and they would say, "Look at that man churning 

 honey !" When I would hear that I would inform them, and 

 they would become interested, and stay and ask all kinds of 

 questions. One time there was a gentleman and lady came 

 along, and asked me if the bees were making that honey. 

 It was late in the evening, and I said, "Yes." The man said, 

 "It is dark. I don't see how the bees can make honey in the 

 dark." I said that I had succeeded in crossing a lighting- 

 bug with bees, and they worked in the dark ; and they actually 

 believed it ! 



Mr. Niver — Mr. Hershiser, at Buffalo, says that he got 

 up an illustrated lecture and gave it at several of the public 

 schools, handling the bees and combs, and taught the chil- 

 dren. They are more teachable than the older people ; they 

 will remember longer and get things straighter. And he has 

 succeeded in working up a ver\^ nice trade in Buffalo. I have 

 thought sometimes it was possible to take a swarm of bees 

 and get them so that they could be shown in the schoolroom 

 for an illustrated lecture, but have never dared try it. 



Mr. York — I have often wondered how we got orders for 

 honey from Buffalo. Now I know. 



Mr. France — On the same idea, our State Normal School 

 sends out about 400 teachers a year, as teachers in the public 

 schools. While I was student there in the school I felt the 

 need of something of this kind, and there were suggestions 

 offered by the students, until it has been now the eleventh 

 year that the Normal School sets apart a piece of a day for 

 instruction on bee-culture, and they come to my house if I 

 have not time to go to the Normal School. They have been 

 there by the score ,and they want to know all there is about 



the bee-business. This week my little boy, seven years old, 

 just starting in, got up and contradicted the teacher, and 

 said, "I know better." Well, they tried to down him, and it 

 you ever saw an angry boy he was one. When he came 

 home, he said, "Papa, when are you going to. have that bee- 

 le ture' The teacher goes on and says so and so about the 

 bee-stinger, and I told her I knew better." The class came 

 out the next day solely to learn what a bee-sting was, and 

 what the bee's mission is when it is depositing that honey, 

 and I explained it to them. On this subject the education is 

 going on, and it is a part of the Wisconsin requirement of the 

 teacher now to teach agriculture in all the schools, and bee- 

 keeping is becoming a branch of that in all the rural districts 



Dr. Miller— I will tell you a little experience I had. and 

 I want to warn you if you go to lecturing in public school^ 

 to practice a little at home before you go. Last week the prin- 

 cipal of the high school asked me to come and spend an hour 

 in talking to the pupils, and one of the first things I did 

 was to tell them about the bee-sting. I made a picture of it 

 on the board and attempted to tell them how it would work. I 

 had all the barbs running the wrong way, and the thing did not 

 work. If you are going to try it, practice at home a little. 



Mr Moore— It is an old saying that Pres. York and 

 others have said many a time, that if the honey in this coun- 

 try was distributed as it should be, there never would be an 

 overplus. Every one of you, it seems to me, could work up 

 his own home market in some such way as this, so t'^at al- 

 most no honey would be shipped to the great centers. Now 

 you have no idea what can be done in the way of interesting 

 people with the commonest things around our apiaries. I 

 will tell you how I worked it here in Chicago. One summer- 

 time, to amuse myself and experiment on the people of Chi- 

 cago, I thought I would try a new thing for this neighbor- 

 hood. I got up a box of regular length and height of a Hoffman 

 frame, so that I could set in it two frames, with brood and 

 bees, having perhaps two or three thousand bees; glass on 

 both sides, and a handle going over the whole thing. I filled 

 that with bees, and I spent days and days on the streets of 

 Chicago. Now my experience was most interesting. In my 

 12 years here I had made acquaintances with policemen and 

 all sorts of people. I said to the policeman at the corner of 

 Adams and La Salle streets, "I will block your street in about 

 five minutes," and he didn't believe it. I had in my arms my 

 little nucleus hive which held probably 10 pounds, and held it 

 up to the policeman so that he could look at the bees. Every- 

 bodv that came there stopped— there wasn't a soul went by. 

 He began to look uneasy inside of three minutes, and said, 

 "I guess you are right." I moved on down the street. I took 

 the''bees into the private office of the Chief of Police, and said 

 "I want to talk on bees in the center of the city." Some of 

 the policemen and the inspectors knew me; and he said. That 

 is all right. He does not want to sell anything. He simply 

 wants to exhibit the bees." I went up on the Court House 

 steps— the top step on the Clark street side, and I soon had 

 two or three hundred people there. I don't know where they 

 got their leisure, but nobody seemed to go out of the crowd 

 while I was there. I had the top of the hive screwed on with 

 screw-eyes. I could screw them in and out with my fingers, 

 and I took out four, one at each corner. Then I took the 

 bees right out, and they thought it was something tremendous ; 

 and for three or four years after I made my exhibit people 

 would say, "You are the fellow that had those live bees. 

 Why, this fellow handles bees like flies. They go all over 

 him " and so on. I did not take the trouble to explain that 

 they were drawing it mildly, but I dropped that question, and 

 went on to teach whatever came up. I did other things. I 

 would take a frame of honey and a frame of empty comb. 

 After we have extracted our honey how beautiful the comb 

 is, if it is a bright yellow and empty; just the mere wax, 

 aiid you hold it up to the light, and you can see the cells on 

 the opposite side breaking joints, as I explained to them. 

 Three cells are opposite one cell on this side, is opposite a 

 third of three cells on the other side. And they would say, 

 "Is that so?" If any of our producers all over our great land 

 will take pains to exhibit but the commonest things, to get 

 acquainted by advertising in the journals and by exhibi- 

 tion of these common things, they can sell enough more honey 

 at home, so that the honey question and the price of honey 

 will be settled. 



Mr. Meredith— I was going to say, in regard to the adver- 

 tising of honey, that a park adjoins my place, and I went there 

 with an exhibit of honey, for the purpose of exhibiting and 

 selling it. I put it up in bottles from half a pound to the 

 Mason fruit-jar. but my sales were slow. A candy-maker, 

 had no trouble in disposing of his wares in packages for five 



