THE CALIFORNIA FRUIT EXCHANGE. 497 



tions was, of course, more than the current expenses. The 

 directors and manager agreed, liowever, that unless twenty- 

 five per cent of tlie stock subscribed would pay for organizing, 

 it would not be best to proceed. They, themselves, paid up 

 their stock in full. 



It may occur to some that these details are unnecessary. 

 I am giving them fully as affording the only means of an 

 accurate study of cooperation. I am reasonably familiar with 

 the literature of cooperation, but what has fallen in my way 

 appears to have been largely the work of enthusiasts, or of 

 mere observers. I have thought it useful to give accurately 

 and in detail the results of personal experience in cooperative 

 work, in order to make clear where the main difficulty lies in 

 the promotion of cooperative work among farmers. They 

 will not pay the expense of organizing, which, when on an 

 important scale, is too large for a few altruistic individuals to 

 assume. 



The expectation had been that the manager, in a few 

 months of preliminary work, would secure funds sufficient to 

 employ the staff required to make a beginning of the actual 

 work which the Exchange was created to perform. As already 

 stated, experience showed that he could hardly secure enough 

 to pay current expenses, and, although some pains were taken 

 to let it be known that a permanent manager would soon be 

 wanted, and that a desirable position would soon be open to 

 any one who should develop a combined talent for organ- 

 ization and business, no one appeared, except the temporary 

 manager, who could make any headway. Obviously it was 

 absurd to continue an organization whose entire energy was 

 consumed in providing for its own existence, and it was deter- 

 mined, after a few months, to attempt the fulfilment of at least 

 one of its duties. All growers, from the beginning of the 

 season, had been anxious for correct information in regard to 

 crop prospects, foreign and domestic, existing stocks of fruit, 

 and the hundred items which go to determine the market 

 prices of agricultural products. Vague or incorrect informa- 

 tion on these points was worse than useless, and information 

 safe to do business upon costs money. No local newspaper 

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