86 ILLINOIS dairymen's association. 



address to the fat stock raisers assembled at Chicago, I said among other 

 things, "There is presented to you by force of circumstances the problem of 

 how to make meat stock raising in the future profitable in Illinois in compe- 

 tition with the same enterprise on the cheap and as yet unsettled plains and 

 prairies of the great Korthwest and Southwest, where the investment in the 

 pasture land, if purchased at all by the grazer, is only nominal, as compared 

 with the investment now required in an Illinois stock farm. 



'■'■ The capacity for producing meat cattle on the western plains in great 

 numbers and at small expense has not yet been limited or bounded, and 

 probably will not be for many years to come. And the ease and cheapness 

 with which marketable cattle are produced in the west becomes more start- 

 ling when we compare it with the cost of producing fat cattle on the farms 

 of Illinois, which arejalready worth from $50 to $200 per acre, when you add 

 to the cost of the production of the stock a reasonable interest on the invest- 

 ment in the land." I excepted, of course, from the difficulties of this problem 

 such fat stock as must be fattened upon grain, such as hogs, etc., for the im- 

 movable centre of that production must remain in the great corn belt of the 

 Mississippi valley. 



It must be a very pleasing thought to you, as I assure you it is to me, that 

 you dairymen have solved this problem for the farmers of Northern Illinois 

 at least for the present generation, and probably for many generations to 

 come. You have changed the farm and stock industry into a line which is 

 beyond the reach of the competition of the western plains. For the dairy 

 business is necessarily the child of civilization and dense population. It 

 must flourish only on well improved farms and in well ordered, well con- 

 ducted homes. It must flourish, where other conditions are favorable, near- 

 est the centre of demand for its rich and perishable products, and where are 

 these conditions more completely met than in Illinois, with her great com- 

 mercial mart, Chicago, and her radiating, variegated and rapid lines of 

 transportation to other great centres of population ? Gentlemen, you may 

 well be jealous ot your position, your calling and your success. Masters of 

 the situation, you produce in such large quantities and rich quality, that in- 

 stead of your material interest being controlled by the m irket manipulators, 

 you are able to control the market, and complacently take forty cents per 

 pound for your butter, if you can't get more, and find ready cash sale for 

 your cream, milk and cheese. In fact, w^hen I go to pay my grocery bill and 

 count up the item of butter, even in this great butter producing state, I al- 

 most feel as if the butter eaters ought to call a convention to put down the 

 monopoly of the butter makers. '' Monopoly," you know, is now the word 

 commonly used to describe every business enterprise that is succegsful. 



But, gentlemen, I do not envy you^ your success. You are justly entitled 

 to its rewards, for your skill, energy and foresight and observance of nature's 

 laws. Your success and profit in carrying on the dairy business on high 

 priced farms will of« course be materially enhanced by the application of 

 scientific knowledge and methods of improving the breed of your cows, so as 

 to obtain the largest and richest yield to the animal, kept at the same ex- 

 pense. But that superior class of intelligence which in a few short years has 

 created such a great and profitable industry will no doubt be equal to the 

 occasion, not only in improving the grade of dairy stock, but in adjusting all 



