32 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



by without an explanation, this scarcity of commercial fruit growers 

 in the state is in many ways a decided advantage to the man who 

 takes it up as a business. At least I should not let it deter me from 

 undertaking the enterprise once I had satisfied myself that it could 

 be made profitable. I have already satisfied myself of this and I 

 should like to suggest some of the factors which, it seems to me, 

 promise success to the man who undertakes to grow fruit here on 

 modern principles. 



To begin with, our climate is adapted to the growing of fruit of 

 the finest quality. No one who has seen and tasted the best c[uality 

 of Massachusetts-grown Mcintosh Red, Sutton Beauty, or Palmer 

 Greening (Washington Royal) it seems to me, ought to doubt our 

 ability to grow apples which will compare favorably for quality 

 with those grown anywhere. And this is certainly a prime requisite 

 to a successful business. For looks, some of the western-grown 

 iruit can certainly discount any apples that I have ever seen grown 

 here, and that is also a very important factor. But if not cjuite 

 so fine in appearance as that from the west, our apples, when well 

 grown, are fine enough to look at, and when you bite into them 

 there is a quality there which I do not believe the best western apple 

 grown under irrigation, as most of them are, can equal. And while 

 fine appearance is always to be desired it seems to me that for the 

 highest type of fruit trade people are sufficiently discriminating 

 that they will very soon learn that the home-grown fruit has the 

 •quality to back it up. 



The second hopeful factor in our situation here in Massachusetts, 

 as I see it, is our nearness to good markets. There is not another 

 section of the United States which can ecjual us in this respect. 

 Within a radius of three hundred and fifty miles from central 

 Massachusetts there are about twenty-three millions of people, a 

 very large proportion of whom are non-producers and are working 

 for good and regular wages. That class of people give the best 

 market possible for what might be called standard grades of fruit. 

 Add to this the fact that we have a large and increasing class of the 

 very wealthy who are not particular what they pay for fruit pro- 

 vided it is of such a quality as to appeal to them, and you have a 

 <'ombination in the way of a market which it would be difficult to 

 improve. 



