864 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Dec. 29. 1904. 



and I am of the opinion that some such action should be 

 begun. The orobabilities are that in nine cases out of ten 

 the offending pubhsher would accede to our demands before 

 actual proceedings could be instituted. 



But suppose he does not. A case in court would attract 

 attention, and would be heralded over the country, and this 

 of itself would show to the newspaper publishers, as well as 

 to the public at large, that there is no such thing as manu- 

 factured comb honey, and that, if they took a hand in pub- 

 lishing or rehashing these lies they might have to pay dearly 

 for their experiment. 



It should be understood that an action cannot be sus- 

 tained in every case. A great deal depends on the nature of 

 the allegations in the first place. 



There is something more that can be done; and that is, 

 for bee-keepers individually to offer a reward for a single 

 sample of manufactured comb honey. It does well enough to 

 say that the A. I. Root Co. will pay $1,000 for such sample ; 

 but who is the A. I. Root Co. to the ordinary consumer of 

 honey? But if the bee-keeper himself, especially if he is 

 known to be responsible to that consumer, can make an offer 

 of $25, $50, or even $100, such offer cannot help silencing 

 the purveyor of the lies. _^ Ernest R. Root. 



Mr. Abbott — I move that a committee of five be appointed 

 by the chair as a press committee representing the various 

 localities of the United States whose duty it shall be to act 

 without pay, to look after all matters pertaining to the in- 

 terest of honey in the public press. Mr. Root has suggested 

 an excellent idea. There is a press committee here, but their 

 duties cease at the close of this convention. If we had five 

 people in five localities who would be co-operating and felt 

 it their duty to look after these things, and to co-operate with 

 the Board of Directors, and when in their immediate locality 

 to write an article and turn it over to John Jones, or who- 

 ever it is, and let him put it into the paper in his own name, 

 I think it would be a good idea. 



Mr. Scott — I had in mind it would be well to have more 

 than five. The United States is a big territory, and it 

 occurred to me that five could not very well gather all of 

 these statements. I wish to say with reference to the sug- 

 gestion offered by Mr. Root that it is very good, but if the 

 Association gets an article out why not have that printed in 

 large quantities and supply all the honey-dealers with it. 

 Everyone, especially those who are members of the National, 

 could use them to the best advantage, even if we had to 

 pay half the price for printing. Personally, I feel to present 

 a printed article of that kind in the name of the National 

 Association would have much more weight than if I did it 

 on my own responsibility. I have so much faith in that that 

 I would take 5,000 of them right away. 



Mr. Abbott— I will enlarge my committee by permission 

 of the seconder, and make it fifteen instead of five. 



Mr. Dadant— I believe it would be advisable to have the 

 editors of all the bee-journals in the United States on that 

 committee. There is no one who can get hold of these slurs 

 published in the press as well as the men who are publishers 

 themselves. They are more likely to read all these items or 

 to have them sent to them by their subscribers than anybody 

 else. We bee-keepers who only read the bee-journals and 

 do not get hold of the general press would not notice these 

 thinsrs as well as the bee-journalists, and it seems to me those 

 men ought to be on that committee, and they can act for us. 

 Those things ought to be crushed out. 



Mr. Whitcomb— In my experience I find that the stories 

 of adulterated honey do not come through the newspapers 

 but through the customers. I find the grocery men taking 

 a very inferior comb honey and pointing it out as good. The ' 

 customer takes the cheap honey at a good price. I find that 

 in Lincoln and Omaha. One of the tricks of the grocery 

 trade is to sell to the customer a poor, inferior section of 

 honey, half capped and half filled, at the price of a good 

 section. 



Mr. Reinecke— If this was put in condensed form and 

 each of us could scatter them, and could get them in the 

 local papers, it would have more weight than it would in 

 the bee-journals. 



Mr. Andrews— I would like to see this include the 

 whole .meeting of the National convention, and let it go 

 into Canada and Mexico if necessary. 



Mr. Van Dyne— There was a motion acted on the other 

 day and referred to a committee, and that committee did 

 not have the written resolution with them in their session 

 and the latter part of it was passed over, and that referred 

 particularly to this same question, that this convention ask ' 



every member to go to their county paper and ask them 

 to publish this reward of $1,000 for two boxes of comb honey 

 filled by hand or by machinery in the United States. The 

 fact of merely publishing this offer would settle the whole 

 business. 



Dr. Bohrer— Let your committee be fifteen if vou wish 

 It, but I want every bee-keeper to consider himself a com- 

 mittee of one to attack those charges through the local 

 press. 



The President put the motion to appoint the committee, 

 which on a vote having been taken was declared carried. 



Mr. Root — I would like to make a suggestion and that 

 is, that the editors of the bee-journals be left out of that 

 cornmittee. There is no doubt but what the editors will do 

 their part; they are very much interested in this question; 

 but include other men. What we want is to give these 

 things a good hammering from different sources. 



The President called for the report of the committee 

 delegated to attend the Pure Food Congress. 



Mr. York, on behalf of the committee reported that he 

 had attended the Pure Food Congress, but had arrived there 

 before they had begun their session ; that he had met the 

 Secretary, Mr. Allyn, and had given him the resolution and 

 acquainted him with the facts, and that Mr. Allyn had 

 promised that he would read the resolution the first thing 

 after the opening of the session. The report of the com- 

 mittee was then received and adopted, and the committee 

 discharged. 



The President called upon Dr. Miller for a song, to 

 which Dr. Miller responded by singing "I'se One of Those 

 Happy Bee-Mans," which was received with applause. 



Mr. Johnson — In St. Louis this morning I found a man 

 on the corner of 27th and Broadway who wanted to buy 

 some honey, having seen the badge on my coat, and he said, 

 "Do you have pure bee-honey?" and I said, "You bet I have." 

 To show you how superstitious he was he ordered six sec- 

 tions. He had seen that article in the Ladies' Home Journal. 



Dr. Drunert — Wouldn't it be much better for us as an 

 organization to authorize our officers to say that we would 

 sue every man and editor for damage, that was not able to 

 prove his assertion as to artificial honey? That would be a 

 warning to all editors to go to the bottom of it and try to 

 find out and see it they could prove what they published. 



Pres. Harris — Mr. J. T. Adams, of Alabama, has pre- 

 sented a honey souvenir to this convention and at this time 

 I wish to refer the same to our Committee on Resolutions. 



Mr, York — I would like to refer again to Mr. Root's 

 paper which I think was a splendid one. With reference 

 to manufactured comb honey so-called, I have been thinking 

 a good deal about it, and have been wondering if it would 

 not be a good idea if every member of our Association, 

 some 2,000 strong now, would, whenever they see anything 

 published about manufactured comb honey, send a marked 

 copy of that paper to our general manager. If this press 

 committee is appointed he could then refer it to a member 

 of the press committee in the locality from which the paper 

 came, and that member could then take up the matter with 

 the publisher and editor. It seems to me every member of 

 the Association ought to be requested to do this, and they 

 ought to have some one place to send all these marked copies. 

 We, as editors, get a good many of them, but some do not 

 think to send them. The general manager, if it is sent to 

 him, can refer it back to the press committee and to the pub- 

 lishers of the papers. I have also thought when he heard 

 of anything of this kind he should take it up in the name of 

 the paper and write thi editor or publisher of the paper, 

 and tell them that he represents this Association, and ask 

 for a correction, and if that is not forthcoming, then 

 through the bee-papers notify the members to write that 

 editor and snow him under. I believe the editors of the 

 daily papers would pay a great deal of attention to that. 

 It seems to me if the matter were dealt with in this way 

 we would get retractions with very little trouble. If 

 finally they refused to retract, then threaten to sue them. 

 I think we ought to have some system about this thing 

 and work it up gradually. The General Manager should 

 at the same time, when he writes to the publisher of such 

 a canard, send him some of the printed matter we have 

 talked of getting up. Prcf, Benton is going to get up a 

 bulletin, and the board of directors is going to get up 

 some facts. Let the General Mana.ger mail them copies 

 of these. After getting all that information I am satis- 

 fied that the average editor would be glad to make a 

 retraction and will undertake not to do it again. 



Mr. Clark — A great many of these comb-honey canards 

 get started from the fact that the average member of the 



