AGRICULTURAL INDUSTRIES 177 



Francisco, threatens to displace the old bushel basket 

 and barrel, as fruit carriers everywhere. 



California raisin machinery has invaded historic 

 Malaga. Packing-houses for all kinds of fruit em- 

 body original work in plan, policy and appliances, 

 and the remarkable results attained in careful han- 

 dling of fruit in the orchard, on the road, in the pack- 

 ing-house and in the cars, and in realizing the ad- 

 vantage of pre-cooling. 



California grows many fruits of the temperate 

 and semi-tropical classes. The list is growing and 

 some are coming into prominence and acreage which 

 are not yet enumerated by the official statisticians, 

 while many others receive attention only from en- 

 thusiastic amateurs. It is not the design of this 

 writing even to approach the categories of kinds and 

 cultures but merely to cite facts enough about par- 

 ticular fruits to indicate to the general reader the 

 materials and conditions that enter into the pursuit 

 of the greatest agricultural industry of California 

 and thus underlie the greatest fraction of the rural 

 life and industry of the State. 



The fruits that are commercially great in Cali- 

 fornia, and their relative importance, are concretely 

 shown by the State Board of Equalization, on the 

 first of March 1920, in the table on page 178. 1 



As it is the function of the State Board of Equal- 

 ization to deal with taxation and as their enumera- 

 tors are the county assessors, securing their data 



1 The amount and value of the 1920 product of these planta- 

 tions, also the movement beyond State lines and the quantities 

 of preserved fruit products are given in Appendices G and H. 



