16 ILLINOIS DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 



our Board, and to make such suggestions in the interests of the Dairy Asso- 

 ciation and for the other dairy interests of Illinois as may help this matter along, 

 and I am requested by members of the State Board of Agriculture, not offi- 

 cially, but individually, to ask you to appoint and send to us a committee, 

 which will give us information which we will be glad to receive. 



But, there are particular facts that you want to know about. I went back 

 to bring up the history to the dairy show. I am willing to confess that on the 

 morning of the opening of the show, when I saw that the large space, 240x75 

 feet, devoted to dairy implements, was absolutely full, not an inch to spare, 

 and yet everybody seemed to have been accommodated with space; when I saw 

 that the dining room, as used by the Exposition Company, was almost entirely 

 full, the tables were filled with butter and cheese product, I confess, gentlemen, 

 that I felt no small degree of pride to think that I had encouraged the dairy- 

 men to bring out so large and so fine an exhibit. 



As I was going about my duties there, a gentlemen presented himself to 

 me and asked me where I- proposed to locate the butterine. Said I, "My good 

 friend, if you will be kind enough to go to the Honorable Mr. Davids, the 

 superintendent of the hog department, he will tell you where to locate it — that 

 is where it belongs. " I supposed that I was done with the enemy of the dairymen, 

 but, unfortunately, I was not. At the first meeting of the Board a resolution 

 was introduced requesting the superintendent of the dairy department to admit 

 oleomargarine and butterine in the dairy department. After a tussle of two 

 hours we succeeded in defeating the resolution. I supposed then that it was 

 done. As the time went on and we all of us got absorbed in our duties, and if 

 any of you know anything about the management of such affairs, you know 

 that one that takes an active part in the management of a fair or show, 

 becomes absorbed with his duties, and when time had rolled on and we had got 

 absorbed, the question came up again. A friend sent me word that the oleo- 

 margarine question was before the Board again, and demanded my attention, 

 and, unfortunately, the fast friends of butter on that Board were partly absent. 



They succeeded not in placing it on exhibition, as has been represented by 

 the press in some instances, not in putting it beside the legitimate butter, 

 but they succeeded, as they said afterward, if they could'nt get a full meal, 

 "please give us the crumbs from your table." They got an out-of-the-way 

 place that we could not use, and got permission to put some tables in and put 

 butterine on them and show it as butterine and oleomargarine, not as butter. 



I did so much regret that our good friends — and we have one of them 

 right here — when they were sent out as a committee by the Butter and Cheese 

 Association, came back and reported to the public that it had been admitted in 

 competition with and alongside of the dairy product. I want to say to you, 

 gentlemen, and I know what I am talking about, this is a mistake. It was not 

 admitted alongside of or in competition, in any form or sense, with butter. It 

 was simply given an out-of-the-way place in the building, and that I objected to, 

 and that a majority of the Board, I believe to-day, if that majority could have 

 been reached, would have objected too. 



The majority of the board believe, and in fact every member of the Board 

 believes, that oleomargarine and butterine whenever they present themselves as 

 a substitute for butter are frauds, and as frauds they ought not to be recognized. 



