i66 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[November, 



The existing shedding will be cleared away, 

 and the whole surface handsomely renovated 

 and supplied with stalls of a convenience and 

 neatness unusual at live-stock exhibitions. 

 Many of the important preliminaries are al- 

 ready provided, since, in addition to the essen- 

 tial railroad facilities already mentioned, water 

 is now distributed throughout the entire tract 

 by service pipes twenty-five feet apart ; 

 thorough drainage can be secured through the 

 adjacent city sewers ; much of the surface is 

 paved ; large numbers of neighboring sheds 

 and barns j)rovide sufficiently for storage of 

 hay, grain, etc.; and hotels hai'd by, formerly 

 used by the drovers, will acconunodate exhibi- 

 tors and their agents. AVhen it is added that 

 the area of the land is such as to admit the 

 construction of a half-mile track for the exer- 

 cise of the animals and their examination by 

 the judges, it will be seen that the managers 

 of the Exhibition have jirovided the means of 

 giving its due prominence to this very impor- 

 tant department of the Agricultural Exhibi- 

 tion. 



Special series of live-stock exhibitions have 

 been provided for as follows : Horses, from 

 September 1 to September 15 ; neat cattle, 

 from September 20 to October 5; sheep, swine, 

 dogs, from October 10 to October 25; poultry, 

 from October 25 to November 10. 



Persons who intend making entries for this 

 exhibition should do so without delay, in or- 

 der that the managers maybe aWe to estimate 

 the number of stalls and extent of other prepa- 

 rations that will be needed. In the large 

 Agricultural Exhibition Building, though it 

 covers ten acres, so many aiiplications for 

 space have been made l)y exhibitors of agri- 

 cultural products and machinery as to necessi- 

 tate an enlargement of the original plan. The 

 display of live stock is likely to be no less pop- 

 ular ; and those wishing to participate in ■ it, 

 even though their applications may require 

 future amendment, sliould lose no time in 

 communicating with Mr. Burnett Landreth, 

 Chief of the Bureau of Agriculture, Interna- 

 tional Exhibition. 



OLEOMARGARINE CHEESE. 



What Shall be Done to Save Our Cheese In- 

 dustry from Ruin ? 



The only salvation for the cheese industry of this 

 country is to abandou tlie manufacture of every 

 quality except full cream cliccse, wliich is tlie only 

 kind entitled to the designation cheese. So-called 

 cheese is made of every gradation of quality, from 

 the poorest skimmed milk article to the rieliest full 

 cream cheese, and sells in the market to-day from say 

 2c. to IS'jC. a pound. If the milk is entirely skim- 

 med the poorest product is the result. This quality, 

 so far this season, is proving an exeeedinfjly unprofit- 

 able manufacture, as it costs to make and sell it at 

 least 3c. a pound, and therefore, at present prices, nets 

 a loss of Ic. a pound. The next quality above contains 

 say 5 per cent, of cream, and being made of good tex- 

 ture and properly colored, brings a relatively higher 

 price ; and so on for all the gradations of iiuality, 

 until when the cheese is made with a mixture of 

 morning milk skimmed and evening milk unskimmed, 

 in equal quantities, an article may be produced by 

 proper care and surface polishing with butter tha't 

 will pass very well with those who are not experts for 

 a full cream cheese, and sell very close up in price to 

 it. Then comes in theoleomargarine cheese, in which, 

 as we stated last week, the cream is all taken off and 

 the oil called oleomargarine, from the fresh fat of the 

 caul of an ox, is substituted in equal weight for the 

 cream. This produces an article which, in many re- 

 spects, so closely resembles the full cream cheese as 

 to be readily sold for it. A skimmed milk cheese mav 

 be easily told by its lack of flavor, its insipidity to the 

 taste, and the absence of any oil when rubbed between 

 the finger and thumb. These characteristics become 

 less noticeable as the quality is improved. In the 

 case of oleomargarine cheese, Tvhile the flavor and 

 taste may be very closely assimilated to the full cream 

 product, it shows the presence of the beef fat or cot 

 ton seed oil very readily. Such oils do not seem to be 

 very brave in this situation, for with the least pres- 

 sure they run. They exhibit the same quality also, 

 but in a higher degree, in oleomargarine butter. 



Last year skimmed milk cheese sold very well up 

 to the beet grades. This year they can hardly be sold 

 at all, and, if sold, at no profit to the maker, who 

 would have done a great deal better by feeding his 

 skimmed milk to his pigs and calves. This article 

 may then be considered as having almost killed itself. 

 It is wanted neither at home nor abroad, and no re- 

 ceiver in this city cares to be bothered with it. One 



reason of this is that the article is too poor to deceive 

 anybody, which does not hold a'ood, however, for the 

 better grades of partially skimmed milk and oleo- 

 margarine cheese. Another reason, and one which, 

 to a consideralile extent, will apply to all inferior 

 grades, and which will help towards a correction of 

 the dirticulty, is that the lower tlie price of the best 

 quality cheese the less jirofit there is in making sub- 

 si itutes, and the opening prices for full cream cheese 

 this season are indicative of a lower range of value 

 fur this product. 



There is, however, another feature in this case. It 

 is well understood in commercial as well as in dairy 

 circles that the word factory applies to full cream 

 chee.se made in factories established for that purpose, 

 and that the word creamery applies to the different 

 grades of skimmed milk cheese made by butter manu- 

 facturers. This distinction is not observed by many 

 of the manufacturers of the skimmed milk cheese, 

 who put the word factory on their boxes, unquestion- 

 ably for the purpose of misleading somebody as to 

 the quality of the product. The manufacturers of 

 the oleomargarine cheese also use the word factory 

 and with the same intention. 



As it is our intention to follow this subject to some 

 conclusion, we have thought it advisable to set forth 

 these elementary facts about the cheese industry as it 

 stands at present, in order that all interested in it 

 may understand the true position of the question. If 

 it were a i|uestion entirely confined to ourselves in 

 this couBtry it might, from our genei-ally demoralized 

 condition on the subject of food products, be less 

 dangerous to the cheese industry to deal in these in- 

 ferior goods; but it is not so. Of the 1,905,978 cheese 

 received here during the year ending May 81 last, 

 1,701, o2S were exported, leaving 204,650 for" our home 

 consumption, about 9 per cent, of the the total re- 

 ceipts. We presume other seaboard markets would 

 show similar results, so that to us here, commercially 

 speaking, it is our export trade in cheese that over- 

 shadows every other con.sideration. How is that af- 

 fected by these practices ? That is the paramount 

 question. Every person here interested in the export 

 trade, and nearly every receiver is, tells us that the 

 presence of these adulterated cheese in the English 

 market is already being I'elt here, and that it is abso- 

 lutely certain, if their manufacture or shipment is 

 persisted in, to react disastrously upon our cheese 

 trade, and ultimately to drive us out of a market that 

 has cost us BO many years and so much labor to es- 

 talilish, and which is so sensitive to the adulteration 

 of its food products as to require the most thoughtful 

 attention of its most celebrated manufacturers of 

 such products to avoid the very difficulties into which 

 we seem to be willing to rush blindfolded,withoutany 

 regard to consequences. Can the dairymen and the 

 merchants who handle their products afford to do 

 this i Must the entire cheese interest of this country 

 be sacrificed out of consideration for a few misguided 

 manufacturers and two or three receivers of this oleo- 

 margarine cheese? There is but one answer. Those 

 who are thus engaged must quit it. We know the 

 sentiment of the cheese receivers and exporters of 

 this city. In due time they will take such action as 

 will place themselves unmistakably against this arti- 

 cle. It wouldbe well for them to say that they regard 

 its manufacture and sale, under any circumstances, 

 as fraught with the utmost danger to the great cheese 

 industry of the country, and that they will not recog- 

 nize or handle the product in any shape. — Aiaericnii 

 Grocer, JV. Y. 



The manufacture of oleomargarine cheese 

 has provoked a very animated, if not acrimo- 

 nious, discussion among dairymen. Tliree or 

 four years ago I\Ir. Ilenry O. Freeman was 

 making butter and skim-niilk cheese, in Che- 

 nango county, N. Y. He made several ex- 

 periments with different materials, to supply 

 the specific elements that had been removed 

 from the milk in the form of cream. At first 

 an inferior kind of butter was employed for 

 this purpose, but the result was unsati.sfactory, 

 as the cheese was oily and soft, in.stead of hard 

 and tough. The discovei'y of oleomargarine 

 suggested to the mind of ]\Ir. Freeman an- 

 other substance for enriching the depleted 

 elements of the skim-milk. This aroused a 

 strong feeling among the regular cheese deal- 

 ers, who denounced the new cheese as a filthy 

 and noxious compound. The agricultural 

 chemists, however, after careful analysis, have 

 shown that the oil-cells exist, and that the oils 

 combined in the oleomargarine are identical 

 with tho.se in butter, minus certain subtle 

 odor-giving elements in the latter, which 

 chemical analysis hits not yet been able to de- 

 tect. In the manufacture of cream cheese, 

 however, these fine cream oils, which give 

 butter its iieculiar flavor are mostly dissipated, 

 and hence cheese can be made of oleomarga- 

 rine, of a composition so nearly identical with 

 that of cream cheese that no "appreciable dif- 

 ference can be detected by analysis. An 



i- 

 of 



American correspondent of tlie English Aijr, 

 cuhuml Gazette has subjected both kinds c 

 cheese to the test of the microscope, and found 

 that the oil in the oleomargarine was present 

 in irregular cavities, whilst in the cream 

 cheese the tiny round oil globules were held 

 closely together in the curd. 



About a dozen factories have already been 

 established in this country for the manufac- 

 ture of oleomargarine cheese, and equipped in 

 the best style. The men engaged in the busi- 

 ness have a considerable capital, and evince a 

 respectable share of energy and business tact. 

 The manufacture of this cheese is advocated 

 on the ground that it utilizes a vast amount 

 of otherwise waste material in the skim-milk. 

 It does not propose to enter into competition 

 with the fine grades of cream cheese. This 

 class of products has an element of profit in 

 itself which would render an attempt to invade 

 its field entirely hopeless. But those inferior 

 brands known to the trade as " half-.skims" or 

 "hard-skims'' will probably be driven out of 

 the market entirely by this process. There is 

 no danger of any attempt to palm off oleomar- 

 garine cheese as cream cheese, as the means of 

 detection are too numerous and too easily ap- 

 plied. Oleomargarine cheese has a function 

 of its own — the supply of cheap food material, 

 which does not attempt to grade with good 

 brands of cream cheese. The severe denun- 

 ciations which met the article upon its first 

 introduction have measurably subsided. Or- 

 gans of the cream cheese interest demand that 

 a careful distinction be made between the two 

 kinds in every market, a necessity which will 

 be less felt in proportion as the cream cheese 

 factories scrupulouslj' adhere to the standards 

 which have given them their specific reputa- 

 tion. [The foregoing we condense from pp. 

 459 and 460, Oct. No. Monthly Report of the 

 Agricultural Department at Washington.] 



If people desire an inferior or low-priced 

 cheese (and mauy can afford no other) it does 

 seem like an arbitrary exercise of influence 

 and power to attempt to prejudice the public 

 against the manufacture or sale of such an 

 article, provided it is sold under its own legiti- 

 mate brand. Skim-milk cheese, under the 

 names of "Dutch cheese," "cottage cheese" 

 [schmrai-kuse) " scalded clieese," &e., has been 

 manufacttired and sold in this country from a 

 date long anterior to that of cream or "En- 

 glish cheese ;" biit this always carried its kind 

 and quality on its very face. Some people 

 prefer to purchase $2.00 shoes to 17.00 shoes ; 

 40 cent, peaches to $1.00 peaches; Uinon cloth 

 (satinet) to genuine l.n'oadcloth, and as inde- 

 pendetit freemen no one thinks of interfering 

 with their choice, albeit these articles may be 

 palmed off as superior kinds. 



We were informed, from a reliable source, 

 that the faculty of Cornell University, N. Y., 

 analyzed this cheese, and made a daily use of 

 it, aiid found it as healthful and palatable as 

 the cream cheese, and much cheaper. We, 

 however, do not ]irofess to be its advocate or 

 champion, but merely give both sides of the 

 question, and let it stand ujion its o\\ii merits. 

 The main thing in which the public is inter- 

 ested is the fact that oleomargarine is liable 

 to be sold for cream cheese ; but even in ihis 

 respect "let me ncjt know I am rolibed and I 

 am not robbed at all," is of as much signifi- 

 cance as the thousand other daily ap]ilications 

 of the maxim. In good truth we do not think 

 the public troubles it.self much aliout the (lues- 

 tion. All the noise has been made by the 

 parties who are pecuniarily interested in the 

 matter, and if it can be compromised in some 

 way satisfactory to Ijotli, the i)ublic will qui- 

 etly submit to being "fleeced," just as it is in 

 a linndred other ways and things, and to 

 which it is as likely to become "used to it" 

 as eels are to being skinned. We imagine we 

 have been eating oleomargarine, or its equiv- 

 alent, these many years in the form of cheese, 

 and prol)al)ly it may be our fiu'tune to do so a 

 little while longer, although we confess we 

 would not like to see our eagle's wings clipped 

 in the foreign cheese trade. 



Renew your subscription for 1876. 



1 



