BEGINNINGS IN CALIFORNIA 47 



for nothing but that he also received a bill at the end of 

 the year as a reward for his pains. It meant that the price 

 would not cover the costs of packing and transportation, 

 let alone yielding anything toward the expenses of produc- 

 tion. It frequently happened that the larger the crop a 

 grower produced the more he was indebted to the packer 

 or shipper at the end of the season. 



Obviously these conditions were unendurable, but as so 

 frequently happens, it seemed that all the bad plans had 

 to undergo a thorough trial before agreement could be 

 reached on a workable basis. Various abortive attempts 

 were made at reconciling the interests of growers and ship- 

 pers. Together they tried to regulate shipments and con- 

 trol prices, but to no avail. The usual outcome was that 

 the growers would find themselves fixed more firmly than 

 ever in the power of the speculators. Mr. P. J. Dreher, 

 at present Vice-President of the California Fruit Growers 

 Exchange, writes of this period: "All attempts so far 

 as I know worked through the commission men and fruit 

 shippers excepting the Pachappa Orange Growers' Associa- 

 tion at Riverside, and the Claremont Fruit Growers' Asso- 

 ciation at Claremont, both of which were operating during 

 the season of 1892-93, the former under the management 

 of T. H. B. Chamblin, while I had the honor of being 

 the president of the latter. Both of these were strictly 

 cooperative organizations of growers."^ In fact, Mr. 

 Chamblin first began to put into practice his ideas of co- 

 operation about 1888. The Pachappa Association properly 

 marks the true beginning of cooperative organization in the 

 California citrus industry, and Mr. Chamblin is fittingly 

 known as the "Father of the Exchange." 



As the average citrus holding is small while the equip- 

 ment necessary for packing is elaborate and costly, it was 

 * Letter to the writer : dated November 19, 1915. 



