COLLAPSE OF THE GRANGER MOVEMENT 69 



implements at less than the retail price. In Iowa, 

 where the state Grange early established an agency 

 for cooperative buying, the agent managed to per- 

 suade a manufacturer of plows to give a discount 

 to Grangers. As a result, this manufacturer's plows 

 are reported to have left the factory with the paint 

 scarcely dry, while his competitors, who had refused 

 to make special terms, had difficulty in disposing of 

 their stock. But the manufacturers of harvesters 

 persistently refused to sell at wholesale rates. The 

 Iowa Grange thereupon determined to do its own 

 manufacturing and succeeded in buying a patent 

 for a harvester which it could make and sell for 

 about half what other harvesters cost. In 1874 

 some 250 of these machines were manufactured, 

 and the prospects looked bright. 



Deceived by the apparent success of grange 

 manufacturing in Iowa, officers of the order at once 

 planned to embark in manufacturing on a large 

 scale. The National Grange was rich in funds 

 at this time; it had within a year received well 

 over $250,000 in dispensation fees from seventeen 

 thousand new Granges. Angered at what was felt 

 to be the tyranny of monopoly, the officers of the 

 National Grange decided to use this capital in man- 

 ufacturing agricultural implements which were to 



