ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 55 



sequently the vote was made unanimous that the next 

 Convention be held at Elgin. 



On motion the Convention now adjourned to meet at 

 Mendelssohn Hall at 8 o'clock, to listen to an address from 

 T)r. John M. Gregory, of the Industrial University, Cham- 

 paign, Illinois, and Gen. L. B. Parsons, Flora, Illinois, 

 President Ohio & M.E.R. Co. 



EVENING SESSION. 



Mendelssohn Hall, Wednesday, 8 p. m. 



Convention called to order as per adjournment, where- 

 upon Gen. L.B. Parsons, delivered the following address, 

 his subject being ''Transportation and its kindred con- 

 nections," 



L. B. PARSON'S PAPER. 



" Transportation : its merits, importance, and future, as connected with 

 production and exchange." 



Gentlemen : This, as I understand, is a meeting of gentlemen con- 

 nected with the dairy interest, the promotion of which has become a matter 

 of great public as well as private importance, a branch of production of 

 rapidly increasing magnitude, and which has in a brief period of time, 

 extended from the partial occupation of a few counties in the Eastern States 

 till it engages the attention of large sections of the West ; resulting already, 

 not only in supplying home consumption, and preventing a drain upon our 

 resources to pay for importations ; but in adding the large sum of fifteen to 

 seventeen millions of dollars annually, to swell the aggregate of our foreign 

 commerce and restore health and wealth to the nation's fi.nances. Not only 

 do the great interests already involved, demand all proper attention and 

 encouragement, but with these we may reasonably expect an almost unlim- 

 ited increase in the near future, of a production which not only adds so 

 largely to the happiness of the human family, but to our national wealth. 



In the southern part of the state, where I reside, though a land of 

 corn and grass, yet we have hitherto given so little attention to dairy pro- 



