456 CALIFOKNIA FRUIT SOCIETIES. 



seemed to be a determination that no one who served them 

 sliould make money, especially when they themselves were 

 not prosperous; and in their blind resentment against those 

 who served them well and did make money, they turned 

 against their own business, and gave their shipments to out- 

 side parties, in nearly all cases paying more money for no 

 better service, and to no better men, and with no better results 

 to themselves, in fact, with not nearly so good results, for in 

 the general scramble for business many irresponsible concerns 

 got in, and many losses occurred through the spoiling of fruit 

 intrusted to those who had no facilities for promptly moving 

 and selling it, and from the failure in business of others. As 

 a matter of fact, it was impossible for any but the growers 

 themselves to control the Fruit Union, if they would only 

 take the trouble to attend the annual meetings and vote for 

 directors of their choice, or place their proxies with those who 

 would do so; but they did neither; the annual meetings often 

 had to do business without a quorum, or to go without doing 

 business at all. The owners of the business would not see it 

 done to their satisfaction, or refrain from finding fault with 

 the way it was done. 



Another source of difficulty to the union was the gradu- 

 ally-increasing embarrassment of many growers who had 

 engaged in the business with high anticipations but without 

 adequate capital, and who, after a time, began to require large 

 cash advances to cultivate and harvest their crops. These 

 advances could be obtained from the forwarding firms, upon 

 contracts to ship their fruit, and usually from no other source, 

 as a growing fruit crop is worthless for security except to 

 persons in a situation to market the product. Some of the 

 directors of the union came to be chosen from among large 

 shippers who bought fruit. These, of course, were really inter- 

 ested to have no outlet except through themselves, in their 

 own vicinity, but they never hindered their neighbors from 

 organizing, and often encouraged them to do so; and as none 

 gave so much business to the union as they, or were so com- 

 petent and interested to manage it well, they were proper 

 persons for directors; and yet their neighbors, while complain- 



