NOVKMBKR. 1919 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CUIiTURE 



717 



iz 



PCfROMTHE^FIELD'OF EXPERIENCE'-S^fS 



REFLECTIONS OF A BACKLOTTER 



Do You Know Little and Talk Much ? If So You 

 Can Be President 



The rojiiarks that I made at the last meet- 

 ing were not at all intended as disrespectful 

 towards the big lights in the bee business, 

 but it seems that since I made them I have 

 become a more important personage in the 

 fraternity. I have been elected president 

 of the local chapter — and this causes me to 

 comment on the art of being noisy. 



Early in life my father impressed on me 

 the imijortance of finding out a reason for 

 everything that happened. That was the 

 thing that got me into all this trouble with 

 the presidency, yet I cannot break the habit. 



I wonder why I was made president. I'm 

 not much of a beekeej^er, as I have before 

 mentioned, but yesterday I bought 13 colo- 

 nies from a fellow who is moving to Wy- 

 oming, making it 32 to date. Then I've 

 ordered 50 two-pound packages from the 

 South to be delivered in May, and that will 

 put me in with the fellows who have taken 

 the third degree. If I'm to be president I 

 must first, or later, be a beeman. 



But I'm worried about the presidency. 

 Or rather I was. I've been looking into the 

 matter a bit, and I may as well let you have 

 the results of my investigation. Maybe some 

 of you fellows will want to be president or 

 something in a beekeepers' association some 

 time and I may as well tell you how, for I 

 don 't expect to keep it always. 



I've written a lot of letters about this 

 and have data about a lot of different or- 

 ganizations. I'm intending to be mighty 

 careful not to mention any names, and I 

 guess I can get away with that, and not 

 tell where any of these associations are. 

 But if you guess them that is no fault of 

 mine. This business of being elected to 

 office in a bee club is about as interesting 

 as the bee business, and, as we all know, that 

 is the most interesting thing there is. 



I always supposed that the president of a 

 bee outfit must have about 10,000 colonies 

 or must in some way have distinguished 

 himself as an expert in beekeeping. I have 

 changed my mind. He must have distin- 

 guished himself, all right, but not always in 

 something that has anything at all to do 

 with beekeeping. I'll tell you about a few, 

 and then you'll see that it is not so hard, 

 after all, to get such a position. It 's all in 

 knowing how. 



The first case that came to my attention 



was that of the secretary of the 



Association. He is a dandy example of 

 what I mean. He went to the meeting of 

 the association about five years ago. Now 

 he actually has five colonies, so those who 



say that he knows nothing about the bee 

 business are liars. But he is the champion 

 talker of the State, and every time anybody 

 got up to say anything on any phase of bee- 

 keeping, this fellow was on his feet right 

 away to comment. He has the happy faculty 

 of making every fellow think that the views 

 he has expressed are just the last word on 

 the subject. So he made friends and they 

 made him secretary. I forgot to sa^y that 

 he has a cousin who is in the printing busi- 

 ness, and lie gets the association business, 

 but that isn 't graft unless you actually get 

 the business yourself. Anybody who would 

 think of competing for that job would be a 

 fool unless he can talk more than the pres- 

 ent incumbent. You know what the farmer 

 said about the camel. 



The next case that I ran into in my hunt 



was the president of the Association. 



He was a state officer of some sort — just 

 what I have not been able to find out; but 

 it had something to do with bugs, so when 

 the beekeepers decided to have an organi- 

 zation he went. Being a sort of political 

 highbinder and hoping some day to get a 

 political job in the agricultural department 

 of the State, he talked a lot. It was all 

 about the beauties of nature and that sort 

 of rot. Then when they really got down to 

 business in organizing he told them about 

 the advantages of everybody pulling to- 

 gether and how fine it was for brethren to 

 dwell together in Christian brotherhood. 

 Of course, that didn 't have anything to do 

 with a bee association, and he didn 't know 

 just what a bee association was supposed to 

 have for its main job; but they made him 

 president, and he has held it for 15 years. 

 Yes, he did just what I am doing, only not 

 so much so. He did buy a few colonies and 

 read a few articles on beekeeping. Really 

 for a time he became quite an authority and 

 wrote a lot for the bee journals, but that is 

 dangerous — or at least more dangerous than 

 making a noise at a bee meeting. He soon 

 stepped on something by giving a lot of ad- 

 vice that everybodj^ knew was bunk, and 

 so the editors were not so anxious to hear 

 from him as they were at first. The moral 

 of this is: make all the noise you want at a 

 bee meeting but be more careful what they 

 get on you in black and white. The last 

 time I told you about my bee investigations 

 I said that anything goes in the journals. 

 I'm taking that back now, with apologies, 

 for I've found out that some things go at a 

 bee meeting that the journals won 't 

 take. I therefore apologize to the journals. 

 I guess you'll think I change my mind a lot 

 about some of these things, but you must 

 remember that I've been a beekeeper only 

 a little while; in fact I've not yet served 

 a full term as president. 



