754 



Gleanings in Bee Culture 



Fig. 1.— Miss Lufille Johnson demonstrating witli bees at the fair at Williamsburg, Iowa. 



HOW I DEMONSTRATED WITH BEES AT THE 

 FAIRS. 



BY LUCILLE JOHNSON. 



I have just received a letter from papa, 

 saying you wished me to tell you about my 

 experience in demonstrating with bees. I 

 must first tell you that I live in Ottumwa, 

 with my married sister, my mamma hav- 

 ing died seven years ago when I was four 

 years old. 



The first of June I go up home and stay 

 until Sept. 1, through my vacation, and 

 help pajia with the housework and the bees. 

 I put together all his sections last year. I 

 can put up a whole box, 500, and not break 

 one. He told me last year that, if I would 

 help him leal well, he would take me to the 

 State Fair, and he did; and of all the fine 

 things we saw there, the one that interest- 

 ed me most was the man in a cage with a 

 hive of bees. I got up close so I could see 

 him. I wanted to see how he did it. When 

 he was through with his demonstration I 

 went to papa and said, "We can do that " 

 He said, "Don't you think you would be 

 afraid ? ' ' 



I told him. that I wouldn't, and he said 



there was to be a fair at Williamsburg the 

 next week, and if I would go into a cage 

 and do just what he told me he would build 

 a cage. Of course I had helped papa with 

 the bees, but had never tried to handle 

 them in a cage; but Tuesday I was there 

 and entered the cage before thousands of 

 people. They were packed around the cage 

 for six rods. I first took a frame, bees 

 and all, and held them up to the wire so the 

 people could see them, as shown in the first 

 picture, then I shook the bees from three 

 frames into a dishpan. I shook them up, 

 then picked them up by the handful, as in 

 the second picture. I filled my straw hat, 

 put it on my head, and went on with the 

 demonstration, and I did nearly as much as 

 papa did. He put a great pile of bees in 

 his shirt waist and in his mouth, but I 

 didn't want to do that. But I gave a dem- 

 onstration each day at the fairs for two 

 weeks, and I was not stung once. 



In the second demonstration the cage was 

 full of flying bees around in the air, and 

 people just begged papa not to let me go 

 into the cage. They thought I would get 

 stung to death; but I w^asn't a bit afraid, 

 and 1 guess that was the reason I did not 

 get stung. 



Ottumwa, Iowa, Oct. 1. 



