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When Hail Hit Last Summer, Fremont 



Tuftie Was Protected. His Farm Bureau Insurance 



Paid Well - To The Tune of $4,300 



IT WAS after supper, almost dark. 

 He heard the wind rising sharply. 

 Then Fremont Tuttie looked out ot 

 his \Nindow. 

 The sky was black with heavy, 

 rolling clouds. Trees and branches were 

 weaving wildly. Suddenly the wind 

 shifted. Then the hail showered down. 



"It didn't last long," Tuftie recalled. 

 But the damage was done. Just north 

 of his farm, near Earlville in La Salle 

 county, corn and bean fields were severe- 

 ly damaged. 



Tuftie found later, that all considered. 

 he had been lucky. Only the northern 

 part of his farm suffered the total fury 

 of the storm. And his hail insurance 

 helped to shoulder a big part of this loss. 



The storm that hit Tuftie's farm 

 started from the Mississippi River and 

 swept east through Whiteside, Lee, and 

 La Salle, finally spending itself in Grundy 

 county. 



On one mile-long corn field on Tuftit's 

 farm, w here the damage was the most cx- 

 tensiNt, the adjuster lor Country Mutual 

 Fire Company, Clifford Harvey, allowed 

 from 10 to yO per cent damage. 



Tuftie's check, covering loss on r)^ 

 acres of beans and 13'> acres of corn, 

 amounted to Si300. His policy, cover- 

 ing his loss, cost him SI 98. It was but 

 one of many paid out by Country Mutual, 

 whose los.scs this year will amount to 

 about 53.000,000, largest in the compa- 

 ny's history. 



The storm that hit Tuftie's crops was 

 one of many that month. A second 

 damaging hail storm swept over northern 

 and central Illinois on Aug. 29. Other 

 storms, more local in character, were re- 

 ported on Aug. 14, 15, and 16. 



La Salle county farmers were paid the 

 most for hail damage and had the greatest 

 number of claims, 512. And because of 

 this terrific loss, appraisers were brought 

 in from Wisconsin and Iowa to help out. 



The heavy loss brought an ugly crop 

 of rumors: the company was broke, it 

 was issuing coupons rather than cash, 

 it was deducting Si 5 for fertilizer value 

 of the soybeans. All were false. 



Country Mutual Fire Company, an 

 lAA affiliate which writes the hail in- 

 surance, has protected itself against such 

 losses. It has a catastrophe fund of 

 51,000.000 to draw on if needed. It 

 has a re-insurance contract with Lloyd's 

 of London if losses exceed income. 



But more important, their losses this 

 year are less than the funds collected 

 this year to pay these losses. It was never 

 a question of money. Insurance compa- 

 nies don't work that way. 



It was more a case, as H.irxey, a veter- 

 an adjuster said, of having the man 

 power to go around. Some tanners just 

 had to wait. August was the worst 

 storm month in the company's history. 

 It took more time than usual to get 

 around. More than 4.500 claims were 

 adjusted and paid. 



On Oct. 6 the company sent out checks 

 totalling 5445,015.61, probably a record 

 for hail claims paid during one day. The 

 largest check was for S17,308. 



A tribute to their work was paid Coun- 

 try Mutual by George E. Metzger. lAA 

 field secretary, at the fall Farm Bureau 

 leaders meeting held recently at Spring- 

 field. 



Tountrv Mutual is giving a uun- 



Above: Hail caused almost total loss In 

 this area of corn field on Fremont Tuftie 

 farm near Earlville in La Salle county. Ba- 

 low, here you can see extent of hail dam- 

 age. Fremon Tuftie, left, and Clifford Har- 

 vey, right, hold ears of seriously damaged 

 corn from some area of field where com 

 in basket on left was picked. Corn at right 

 is from the same field, but on southern end 

 one mile distant, and shows little damage. 

 Many of the cobs on ears of poor corn 

 were infested with blue mold. 



dcrful service by furnishing this kind o( 

 hail protection to Farm Bureau mem- 

 bers," he said. "And they are doing it 

 at about two-thirds the cost charged when 

 the hail insurance was established." 



The storms did one thing well. It 

 taught many the value of insurance, as 

 Tuftie said. He had gone five years 

 without hail insurance before starting in 

 again two years ago. 



But he'd never be without hail insur- 

 ance again. 





16 



L A. A. RECORD 



