178 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 



FRIDAY AFTERNOON. 



CO-OPERATION OF STATE FOOD DEPARTMENT AND 

 STATE DAIRY ASSOCIATION. 



Hon. \V. Scott Matthews, State Food Commissioner 



Air. Chairman, Gentlemen of the Ilhnois State Dairymen's As- 

 sociation : 



I want at this time to thank your officers and your Presi- 

 dent and Secretary, in particular, for the hearty co-operation 

 that they have rendered our department. The dairy products 

 of our state are the most important, as we take it, more closely 

 allied to the Food Commission, than any other one single product 

 that is consumed for food. We have developed that industry 

 as far as we could and tried to be of benefit to the industry. 



At Centralia, Illinois, my old home, we have assisted the 

 industry, and the result has been that where there was no dairy 

 industry at all a short time ago, there is now one of the best 

 creameries in the state, and they are enlarging their plant. There 

 are between six and seven hundred cows within a radius of six 

 miles, and they are shipping in cows from Wisconsin, as good 

 cows as they are able to buy. The bankers of that city have all 

 agreed to furnish funds, and any man, whether a renter or a 

 land owner, if he is industrious and honest, can buy all the cows 

 that he can and will take care of. The banks will pay for them 

 and charge him the usual legal rate of interest, taking the cows 

 as security. 



We are trying to inaugurate and develop that industry at 

 different places in Southern Illinois, and we have met with great 

 success. The bankers, as a rule, take very kindly to the proposi- 

 tion. 



