66 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



WHAT WE CAN LEARN AT THE NEW ENGLAND 

 FRUIT SHOW. 



(Stereopticon Lecture) 

 Prof. E. F. Hitchings. 



Mr. President and Ladies and Gentlemen: 



I was asked sometime ago to give you an idea of what was 

 to be learned at the New England Fruit Show. Some of you 

 were there, and I am very sorry indeed that you were not all 

 there; because it seemed to us that it was an object lesson that 

 ought not to be lost on any fruit grower in New England. I 

 have prepared some slides that will be thrown on the screen, and 

 will endeavor to give you a sort of a bird's eye view of what 

 we held in Boston as a New England fruit show, the first of its 

 kind ever attempted. 



I will first go back a little and give you the history of this 

 movement. Last fall, at the meeting held by the governors' 

 conference, one of the principal speakers was a fruit man, well 

 known to many of you. His address attracted the attention of 

 the fruit men present, and especially the nursery inspectors of 

 New England. So a meeting was called soon after at the 

 State House, and at that meeting the inspectors proposed secur- 

 ing, if possible, uniform nursery laws for New England. In 

 the discussion that followed, one of the members. Prof. Sander- 

 son of New Hampshire, suggested a New England fruit show. 

 Every one at the meeting was then enthusiastic over the prop- 

 osition, and later on when we held another meeting and devised 

 a scheme to secure, if possible, uniform laws for New England, 

 this other plan materialized. 



If you are not all familiar with the statutes passed last winter 

 affecting the fruit interests, I wish you would become posted. 

 There are several acts ; the law that has been cited several times 

 regarding our packing of fruit is one, but the one to which I 

 wish to call your special attention is that relating to better 

 nursery stock. You know that Maine has had the reputation 

 of setting out the refuse stock of New York and other cenrers. 

 You know, those of you who set trees forty and fifty years ago, 

 that not one in a hundred of those trees lived, so you did not 



