664 



AMERICAN BEE JOUENAL, 



Oct. 19, 189y. 



QEOROE W. YORK, Editor. 



PUBLISHT WEEKLY BY 



Qeoroe W. York & Company, 



118 Michigan St., Chicago, III. 



ONE DOLLAR A YEAR. ^%^ SAMPLE COPY FREE. 



[Entered at the Post-Office at Chicago as Secoud-Class Mail Matter.] 



United States Bee- Keepers' Association. 



Organized to advance the pursuit of Apiculture ; to promote the interests 

 oi bee-keepers ; to protect its members ; to prevent the adulteration of 

 honey ; and to prosecute the dishonest honey-commission men. 



AJembership Fee^^l.OO per Aantim, 



Executive Committee— Pres., E. Whitcomb; Vice-Pres., C. A. Hatch; 



Secretary, Dr. A. B. Mason, Station B, Toledo, Ohio. 

 Board of Directors— E. R. Root; E. Whitcomb; E.T.Abbott; C. P. 



Dadant; W. Z. Hutchinson; Dr. C. C. Miller. 

 Gen'l M.1NAGER AND TREASURER— Eugene Secor, Forest City, Iowa. 



VOL. 39. OCTOBER 19, 1899. NO. 42. 



Note— The American Bee Journal adopts the Orthography of the follow- 

 ing Rule, recommended by the joint action of the American Philolog- 

 ical Association and the Philological Society of England: — Change 

 d" or "ed" final to "t" when so pronounced, except when the "e" af- 

 fects a preceding sound. 



Section=Cleaning Hachines.— What has become of 

 them ? For a time their name was legion, and sections 

 were to be no more scraped by hand. Now, when the time 

 of j'ear for scraping sections has again come and gone, no 

 word is heard about them, and not a single section-cleaner 

 offered on the market. Is Yankee ingenuity to be baffled 

 by such a little thing as a section-cleaner ? 



Poet Bee=Keepers.— Editor Hutchinson says it is pleas- 

 ant to know that we have in our ranks both a poet (Hon. 

 Eugene Secor) and a composer of music (Dr. C. C. Miller). 

 Please don't forget Mr. H., that altho Mr. Secor has done 

 such fine service in writing bee-keepers' songs, he is not 

 our only poet. Will Ward Mitchell has written much 

 poetry for the Progressive Bee-Keeper, and that of no mean 

 order. 



Poisoned from Inhaling Boiled Bees Mr. Thomas 



Elliott, of Cook Co., III., writes the following account of a 

 serious experience he once had when rendering a lot of 

 combs from colonies that had starved : 



Some three years ago I boiled down the combs from 150 

 hives in which the bees had starved out during a dry spell 

 in California, and there were a great many dead bees in the 

 combs. I used the extractor-tank out-doors, and it took me 

 two days. From that time on my health failed. I can best 

 describe it by saying that in one year I had become 40 years 

 older. Every sense, feeling, or organ, in the humanbody 

 that can be affected came under the influence of the poison. 

 I was in a manner paralyzed, and the doctors told me that I 

 could live but a short time. 



But I found a doctor in Chicago who had tlie disease 



described in a book, and under his treatment I recovered. 

 I then knew for the first time what the trouble was, and 

 had I not found this man I would never have known what 

 ailed me. I have known a number of cases like mine, but 

 they never knew what the trouble was. One feature of the 

 disease is that it runs its course in from one to three years, 

 leaving the patient as well as before. 



In boiling down the combs it distilled the poison out of 

 the bees, and as I workt over the tank I absorbed the poison 

 into my system. 



I want to say to bee-men. Don't boil a dead bee, or a 

 live one, for that matter ; you might be sorry for it. 



Thos. Elliott. 



Have any of our readers been affected as Mr. Elliott 

 describes, after inhaling the steam or odor from boiled 

 combs and bees when rendering beeswax ? If so, we should 

 be pleased to know it, as no doubt would also manj' others. 



Is Honey a Lu.\ury or a Necessity ? — At Philadelphia 

 some thought people would buy honey as a luxury, if it was 

 low in price ; others thought we should teach it is a neces- 

 sity, not a luxury. In the Bee-Keepers' Review Editor 

 Hutchinson says : 



"As a rule, I think that people buy honey because the^" 

 want it, and that they care very little whether it is called a 

 luxury or a necessity. It is possible, however, that some 

 people would buy it who do not use it. if they could be con- 

 vinced of its healthfulness — they might then look upon it as 

 a necessitv. To accomplish this is the work of the honev- 

 leaflet." 



Bee=Keepers Who Injure the Honey Market are still 

 being heard from. A good sample of how a certain honey- 

 producer did was reported to us the other day. He probablj- 

 is one of the deluded kind that think it doesn't pay to take 

 and read a bee-paper. He sent two barrels of honey to a 

 Chicago commission house to be sold. A representative of 

 the firm called on a honey-user and said his concern had 

 two barrels of honey they wanted to sell, but was told that 

 no more honey was needed just then. " Well, make me an 

 offer, anyway," was the reply. The honey-user said altho 

 he didn't want it just theti, he'd give 2^ cents a gallon /or 

 it! He got the honey because the commission firm didn't 

 care enough about it to try to get what it was worth. 



Two cents a pound for honey that was worth at least 

 seven cents I And how much did the producer get out of 

 the two cents after deducting commission, freight and cart- 

 age ? Surely, no reader of a good bee-paper these days 

 would be such a fool as to send his honey to a firm like the 

 one mentioned. It pays to read bee-papers. 



Following the Grand Army. — Dr. Miller says this in 

 Gleanings in Bee-Culture about holding the annual na- 

 tional bee-keepers' convention in connection with the 

 Grand Army meeting : 



"Following the Grand Army with the United States 

 Bee-Keepers' Association convention has its disadvantages, 

 but the)' are far outweighed by the one distinct advantage 

 of low railroad fares that cannot be so surely counted upoit 

 at any other time. By all means, let the settled policy be 

 to follow the G. A. R.'' 



Then Editor E. R. Root follows with this footnote : 



"The only objection that can be urged against follow- 

 ing the Grand Arm\- is the inconvenience at hotels, and the 

 general crowd. But we had none of those troubles at Phil- 

 adelphia ; and I think that, in spite of that, Chicago, our 

 next place of meeting, will be big enough not only to en- 

 tertain the Grand Army, but the members of the United 

 States Bee-Keepers' Association, or what may then be the 

 National Association." 



The executive committee of the Chicago Bee-Keepers' 

 Association expects to make arrangements for caring satis- 

 factorily for those attending the convention next year in 

 this citj'. But they can't do any better than did the Phila- 

 delphia bee-keepers, we are very certain. 



