234 SYSTEMATIC POMOLOGY 



lines of horticultural practice. Spraying was 

 the popular problem, the popular interest 

 one might almost say the popular fad. Next 

 came cover crops, and every bulletin was full 

 of peas, clover, and hairy vetch. Along with 

 these came cultivation, fertilization, pruning 

 (including Stringfellow), pollination, thinning 

 the fruit, and every other scheme for making 

 fruits and gardens more productive. The im- 

 provement of the practice of fruit growing 

 developed almost into a fury. 



Then came 1896. In that year there were 

 more apples grown than could be sold. Men 

 saw at once that the means of production had 

 outgrown the machinery of distribution. Thus 

 the public attention was turned to the science 

 of fruit marketing, where again the popular 

 interest and enthusiasm have been as intense 

 and as effective as at a college football game. 



All this while the field of systematic pomol- 

 ogy has laid fallow. Nothing was done, or 

 next to nothing. Only very recently have a 

 few men essayed to study varieties broadly, 

 to describe, name, and classify them properly. 

 Thus have practical fruit growing and scien- 

 tific fruit marketing outgrown systematic 

 pomology the real basis of all the rest. 



