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TWENTY-NINTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



dig them up? If you will all explain why you dug up your trees we 

 will see it is not from the fact of overproduction, but from the fact that 

 there is something else you can produce which will bring greater returns 

 than what you were producing. I dug up cherries, pears, plums, prunes, 

 apricots, and peaches, and went to raising apples, simply because 

 I found that apples would bring me $200 or $275 an acre when the 

 others would only pay me $120 or $130. That is the reason. It seems 

 to me that this matter of overproduction and markets was not touched 

 upon as fully as it should have been. Now, I notice that the baking- 

 powder people, and the H. 0. mush people, and the manufacturers of 

 all these other food products have agents in every town. They come 

 into a store and they fix up a nice stand, and when you come in you 

 are invited to partake of all kinds of delicacies, gotten up in the best 

 manner. The store in which they are exhibiting these articles handles 

 the goods and there is a set price upon them, 10 cents if you please, for 

 seeded raisins, or whatever the goods may be, and the merchants in 

 these towns do not object to handling the goods at the set price. It 

 seems to me that the same plan could be used in distributing raisins, 

 and prunes and other dried fruits. They have got to catch all that 

 comes their way, because the other fellow is doing something in that 

 direction. This overproduction, to my mind, is only local and spas- 

 modic. We kind of "let go." AVe don't reach out for the markets, 

 because we think Ave have them; we sleep on our rights. You do not 

 take advantage of your opportunities and push the market, because you 

 had it last year; and that is probably the cause of all this roar of 

 overproduction. It is lack of "push" that is hurting you. The trouble 

 with us in our section of the country is that we have not got enough 

 stuff to push. If you who are suffering from lack of markets will pur- 

 chase some of our lands and plant them out to orchards we will receive 

 you with open arms, because we have not enough growers. We get 

 $1.15 a box for apples now and we were only getting 40 cents a box 

 eight years ago, and we have 2,000,000 trees growing now while we had 

 not at that time 100,000. Now, I believe the same proposition is appli- 

 cable to all the fruit products of this State — push the business and you 

 will have the market and keep it. Get the products to the mouths of 

 the people, and do it in the way the yeast-powder people and others do. 



MR. WHITE. Mr. Chairman, not having been present at the time 

 Mr. Kearney made his remarks, I can hardly answer anything he has 

 said or offer counter-arguments. I have already stated to this Conven- 

 tion my views upon overproduction. While I still believe I was correct 

 in what I said, I am willing to admit that improvements may be made 

 in the manner and method of marketing and in the extension of our 

 markets. Unless the Chair especially requests it, I would not care to 

 adduce any arguments or attempt to answer something when I do not 

 know what I am answering. 



