98 



l)ottom fell o)it: of the market and the bottom fell out bet'uro 

 the Heath Apple Exchange had their apples ready to sell. 



They shipped their apples into eold storage through' a 

 commission man who held them in storage and sold them 

 when he thought the market was ready for them, and did 

 very well. The apjjles were sold in Hartford largely, and 

 considering the conditions under which they had to sell, the 

 lower market, they got out of the 191') crop just about 

 even. To give you exact prices — I do not know as thcst^ 

 are secrets, might just as well give them to you — the A 

 grade returned .^^3.20 f. o. b. shipping station ; $2.20 for the 

 ]>. grade, and $1.95 for the ungraded. Now. this is in 

 1915. Out of 1100 barrels about 90 barrels, less than 10 

 per cent, packed A; H grade was 249, and 727 ungraded. 

 Ho you see more than half of the apples went into ungrad- 

 ed, did not grade up to !>. yt-t 1 sutipose the 1915 crop of 

 apples around Franklin Comity was rather l)etter on the 

 whole than this year's in ([vudity. That was hardly an 

 auspicious begiiuiing. Those men could have sold their • 

 crop to the early l)uyers for more money than they got out 

 of it after all their trouble, but while Heath is not a very 

 big town, and it is one of the little towns back on tlu^ hills, 

 it has the right kind of people there and thej" stuck and 

 came back this year. 



They had a few men who believed in the undertaking 

 and instead 'of throwing up their hands they understood 

 the conditions and they came back. They did not have to 

 hire any outside packer this year and they packed their own 

 crop with the packers who had schooling the year before. 

 Their crop was smaller ])ut they packed about 200 l)arrels 

 of A grade, and 650 of ungraded. Their whole crop you see 

 was much less than manv of our single growers. There 

 {\re lots of growers in Franklin County who pack a good 

 many more barrels of apples than this Exchange of some 15 

 growers. They sold these apples f. o. b. shipping station at 

 Hhelburne Falls for $:3.25 for A and $2.25 for B grade. 



Now. I knoAv nuuiy a crop of apples in Franklin County 



