70 



the eastern part of the state who had never attended a meet- 

 ing of that sort would have any conception of what enthus- 

 iasm you have up here. Although it is being developed 

 around New England, it is something that has not been 

 disseminated at least in the eastern part of the state. 



I had the privilege of being in Lewiston not long ago, 

 and saw the same tendency in Maine. The Lewiston Chamber 

 of Commerce were entertaining the Maine State Pomological 

 Society, and there the business men and the farmers were 

 getting together. 



Now, that is something that ten years ago was absolutely 

 impossible. It was not the fault of either the business men 

 or the farmers alone. Pehaps we were too independent. 

 We New England farmers are altogether too independent, 

 to my notion. We are always, you might say, looking for 

 trouble, or at least have been in the past, and perhaps when 

 any organization of business men would invite an organiza- 

 tion of farmers to cooperate with it. why, the farmers began 

 to look for the nigger in the wood pile, and the business men 

 would think that they had nothing in common with the 

 farmers. 



That day, without the slightest doubt, has passed. The 

 business men are sometimes taking up their old homesteads 

 not alone as summer places but are producing and sending 

 that product to market, and they find that the farmer has 

 got a straight up-and-down problem to deal with. He isn't 

 making the money that perhaps some folks think he is. He 

 has got a good hard row to hoe in the help line alone, and 

 in the financial line, also. The business man is realizing 

 that the farmer can help him, and the farmer is reciprocat- 

 ing. 



I was asked to say a few words in regard to the Massa- 

 chusetts Fruit Growers' Association. Recently, in going 

 over the books, only as far back as 1908, the receipts for the 

 year were under $100, while the receipts when the books 

 were balanced in March 1913 were over $1000. Of course, 

 that is not an entirely fair comparison, because we had the 

 Worcester meeting in March and there was also the January 

 meeting in Boston, which were included between the two 

 balancings of the books; but it gives an idea in general as to 



