June 20, 1907 



Amc^rican IBec Journal 



547 



Mr. Burdette — Practically old stocks. 



Mr. Taylor — Weren't people pretty 

 well advised as to old stocks? 



Mr. Burnette — They certainly were 

 not. The newspapers seem to believe 

 what the people want is elementary in- 

 struction in horticulture. The fact is, 

 most people don't know much about it. 



Mr. Taylor — Did the instruction con- 

 sist m directing as to gardening, as to 



plant- 



Mr. Burdette — Simply general instruc- 

 tions. 



Mr. Taylor — Not particularly as to 

 purchase of seeds, simply how to take 

 care of the plants? 



Mr. Burdette — What plants are suit- 

 able for certain places. One article 

 might be how to make a backyard gard- 

 en, what kind of shrubs or perennials to 

 plant, and how to take care of them. 

 So about the color of the blossom, the 

 kind of soil, whether to plant in a 

 shady or sunny place. 



Mr. Taylor — -And what parallel is 

 there between advertising in that way 

 in regard to horticulture and in regard 

 to honey ? 



Mr. Burdette — Of course, we would 

 have to advertise in a different way in 

 regard to honey. The only parallel is 

 generally that all advertising, if good 

 for one thing, is good for another. 



Mr. Taylor — What instruction could 

 you give in an advertisement in regard 

 to honey that would be of benefit? 



Mr. Burdette — Of course, it is not an 

 advertisement. It is simply a little arti- 

 cle. 



Mr. Taylor — The effect is the same. 

 That is, you look for an effect from the 

 advertising, though you manage to get 

 your advertising done without paying. 

 Still, that is all the good effect you get, 

 because your things are advertised. 



Mr. Burdette — I should say that you 

 could publish interesting facts about 

 honey. Tell the people some things 

 about honey, and they would begin to 

 think about honey. If you told them 

 the value of honey from the food stand- 

 point, perhaps they would buy some. 



Mr. Todd — There are two kinds of 

 advertising. There is the plain, straight- 

 forward kind of advertising and the in- 

 sidious. Mr. Burdette has been direct- 

 ing the insidious campaign in favor of 

 the seed-business. 



Mr. Burdette — It is more in the na- 

 ture of general publicity than advertis- 

 ing. 



Dr. Miller— If Mr. Burdette knows 

 how to put the things before the public 

 that we would like to get before them, 

 we can get them to want honey a little 

 more than they do now. Do you be- 

 lieve you could do anything of that 

 kind? 



Mr. Burdette— Well, I do believe that 

 I could get interesting facts about honey 

 published in the newspapers. I suppose 

 unquestionably that would increase the 

 sale of honey. I do not see why it 

 should do otherwise. 



Dr. Miller — Then I would say if you 

 could increase the demand in that way 

 we could sell it for a higher price. Do 

 you believe, sir, that you can get the 

 papers to put in some suggestion that 

 honey is a good thing, that it is more 

 wholesome to have honey than candy 



for children, and that they would live 

 longer if they had honey? 



Mr. Burdette— Of course not in those 

 words. 

 Dr. Miller — I am not asking that. 

 Mr. Burdette — Of course, I have nev- 

 er tried to get anything about honey in 

 the newspapers, but we have got stuff in 

 about flowers and plants. 



Mr. Todd — Entirely different ; very 

 different. 



Dr. Miller— I don't know, sir, that it 

 is entirely different. I think he could 

 do it. 



Mr. Burdette— My personal opinion 

 would be that 1 can. 



Mr. Chapman — I would like to state 

 that Mr. Hutchinson had an article in 

 the Cosmopolitan a few years ago that 

 was interesting enough for the magazine 

 to publish it, and was widely read over 

 the United States. I had friends tell 

 me that the best they ever read about 

 bee-keeping was that article, and such 

 articles could be put in the daily news- 

 papers, not as extensive as his, and they 

 would awaken an interest in honey. 



Mr. Thompson — When it comes to 

 newspapers printing anything that is 

 given to them on the subject of bees, I 

 think they will print anything — some 

 newspapers will. Perhaps there are 

 some here that will remember two or 

 three months ago the Chicago Record- 

 Herald had an article stating that a 

 bee-keeper in Iowa who had keept bees 

 for a number of years died, and his 

 bees commenced to sulk, they would 

 work no longer, and they had trouble 

 keeping them away from his remains — 

 they followed him to the grave, they 

 had such an attachment for him. So if 

 a newspaper will print anything like 

 that, you can get them to print anything, 

 can't you? 



Mr. Abbott — It seems to me very clear 

 that here is a plan of advertising that 

 is almost unlimited. I have had a good 

 deal of e-xpcrience. I am a newspaper 

 man myself, and I haven't an ax to 

 grind and I am not scared at advertis- 

 ing. But let me tell you about a class 

 of advertising that is done all over this 

 country that you have read and did not 

 know it. There is a woman who writes 

 from some place in Kentucky, that signs 

 her name "Kentuckian" mostly. She is 

 employd by the Sapolio people, and the 

 Pearline people, and the borax people, 

 and several otlier people, and she writes 

 home articles for papers. Her articles 

 appear all over the United States in 

 agricultural papers in the home depart- 

 ment, and the only thing that is in them 

 — for instance, she will tell how to clean 

 carpets, and the only thing that smacks 

 of an advertisement is that she gets in 

 the name Sapolio once in a while. The 

 borax trust have women employed in 

 the same way. One writes from Em- 

 poria, Kans.. to the home department 

 of agricultural papers. She recommends 

 borax for sore eyes, and horaie acid for 

 all sorts of things. They try hard to 

 "work" us. They "worked" my wife 

 for a little while. She is better natured 

 than I am. I eliminated the bora.x. I 

 said, "some good disinfectant." I elimi- 

 nated Pearline and said, "some good 

 washing powder." and of course the arti- 

 cles stopped when I edited them, which 

 was a good thing. It could just as well 



be honey as borax, and if General 

 Manager France would arrange with a 

 half dozen men like Dr; Miller and Mr. 

 York and others that I can mention, to 

 write the articles, they can be put mto 

 99 out of lOO of the newspapers of the 

 United States tomorrow, without any 

 trouble at all. That will boost honey 

 just as high as you want it before the 

 public, and it will double the demand 

 for honey all over this country in a 

 little while. I wish the National As- 

 sociation would just take up that kind 

 of thing and spend two or three thous- 

 and dollars lying in the treasury doing 

 nothing in advertising honey all over 

 the United States. 



Dr. Miller — I want to endorse what 

 Mr. Abbott has said, and then add this: 

 The material that we would want to go 

 before the public, there would be in it 

 no trick. This is no "Sapolio" business. 

 It is all square, honest work. Here is 

 information that the public needs, it is 

 for their benefit. We can get it in. 

 I believe, further, that instead of hav- 

 ing me do a part of it and Mr. France, 

 and so on in that way, if this work 

 has been done for the horticulturists, 

 the experience that has been gained in 

 doing that work will be of immense ad- 

 vantage in our work. But, as I said 

 before, I have not examined carefully 

 the material of which this man is made. 

 If he is; put together so that he can 

 get things into papers, I would rather 

 a good deal get some man who is ex- 

 pert at it to do it than to have us bung- 

 lers go at it. It would be worth a great 

 deal more. I don't know him at all, 

 and I don't know what commission he 

 may get on what he can do, but if 

 he or his concern to which he is at- 

 tached can do the work, I believe it 

 would do us a lot of good to pay some- 

 thing for it. 



Pres. York — I know Mr. Burdette a 

 little bit, and anything he would pre- 

 pare would be submitted to Mr. France 

 or a committee designated to revise any- 

 thing he might write. But I am satis- 

 fied that he can get things into papers 

 that we could not at all, because he has 

 been doing it. 



Mr. Kimmey — I was surprised when 

 Mr. Burdette came in today. I have 

 known Mr. Burdettefor a long time, but 

 I did not know he had been engagea 

 in the horticultural business. I did not 

 know he knew Mr. York, nor that he 

 was coming here. I also know some- 

 thing about the seed trade. Mr. York 

 has told you that I am Secretary of the 

 National Poultry Association, whose 

 business it is to give a poultry show in 

 Chicago. For every meeting I have 

 been in the habit of employing some 

 press agent. Last year I employed Mr. 

 Burdette, and he is head and shoulders 

 above any other men and women I have 

 employed. I have a new contract, 

 signed a few days ago, agreeing to pay 

 him two or three hundred dollars for 

 three weeks' work. You have all got 

 articles in your papers. We worked it 

 up. We have them in nearly all the 

 papers. It is an educational business. 

 You don't need to hide a single thin$ 

 when we talk about honey. We don't 

 have to misrepresent a single thing. 

 Without knowing that Mr. Burdette was 

 at all to blame for it, or had anything 



