CHAPTER VIII 



UNEQUAL FIGHTS ON MANY FIELDS 



O-OPERATION as a remedy for the farm- 

 er's troubles was nothing new when the 

 Farmers' Exchange began its disastrous career. 

 The Exchange was, in fact, only one in a long 

 series of experiments, mostly futile, with a 

 principle that abroad had proved an illimit- 

 able boon to both producer and consumer. 

 So far back as 1889, when the losses through 

 false grading and other ill conditions were 

 growing to their worst, co-operation had been 

 approved to such an extent that in many 

 communities "farmers' elevators," conceived 

 and operated on the co-operative principle or 

 pretending it, had begun to break into the 

 grain business. By that time the "line" ele- 

 vator was developing into the iron-fisted con- 

 trol of the farmers' market it afterward at- 

 tained, and the appearance of the co-operative 

 elevator in competition with this was not 

 viewed wkh rapture, as one can readily under- 

 stand, on the Chamber of Commerce. 



The "line" elevators all acted together, as 

 I have indicated in the story of John Evans, 



123 



