ORIGIN OF CHICK TRADE 



271 



hatching into the actual sale of baby chicks. The story goes 

 that a poultryman agreed to do some hatching for a neighbor as 

 an accommodation. This neighbor died suddenly while the 

 hatch was in progress, whereupon the poultryman was at a loss 

 to know what to do with the five hundred chicks which he had 

 incubated. He had no facilities for brooding the extra chicks, 

 and he could not afford to kill them. It occurred to him that 

 some of the townspeople might buy them to place under their 

 sitting hens. 



Accordingly this poultryman placed some of the chicks in a 



(.Courtesy Watson Mfg. Company) 



Fig. 172. — Series of double-deck mammoths in a large Eastern 

 hatchery. 



basket, covered them over carefully to keep them warm, and set 

 out to peddle what he conceived to be a very strange assortment 

 of wares. 



Sold Out. — ^To make a long story short, this poultryman not 

 only sold all of his extra chicks without any trouble, but he dis- 

 covered that he could have disposed of hundreds more. He found 

 that farmers and backyard poultry keepers were only too eager to 

 avail themselves of the opportunity, and to pay a fair price for 

 the chicks. It was an inspiration to the poultryman. He rea- 

 soned that if farmers in his own community wanted to buy chicks 



