30 PROCEEDINGS OF NINETEENTH FRUIT GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



our own agent to attend to our business — we would receive better prices 

 for our goods and a fair return for our labor. Our prices on the Erie 

 were better than the prices on the West Shore, and consequently we 

 made more money than did our neighbors. I am willing to give, if you 

 desire, the prices received by us and those received by our neighbors, 

 which will prove that we did better, and have done better, than we 

 would have done had we kept with the West Shore. 



My object is to act independently the coming season, and I don't 

 desire to be put in a position so that it can be claimed I have violated 

 any agreement or acted improperly. There is but one way to save this 

 interest, and that is by making ourselves independent of any organiza- 

 tion that may be controlled by one or two individuals. 



If the fruit-growers kept together, as some did on the American River, 

 they would have made more money than they did in the past. We 

 selected our own agent, who represented us faithfully and honestly, and 

 therefore we made money. If you will eliminate from this organiza- 

 tion men who have in the past controlled the fruit industry, you and 

 the State will be benefited. As Colonel Weinstock ably showed — and I 

 presume some of you gentlemen know he has labored well and faith- 

 fully for us in the past — he has proved that the growers have been 

 deprived of their portion of the profits made out of fruit-growing in 

 this State. He showed us how some have profited through the manner 

 in which our products have been handled, and yet, in the next sentence 

 he advised us to ship by the same line and place our interests in the 

 hands of those gentlemen who have absorbed nearly all the profits made 

 from this industry. 



Now, I say that if the fruit-growers would declare their independence, 

 if they would act for themselves, if they would select their own agents 

 and be independent of the control of these gentlemen, who, by the way, 

 are personally my friends, I say that then there might be some hope 

 for them in the future. That would be one of the greatest things that 

 could happen to the fruit-growers of this State. 



If you will examine closely the record made by the Bureau of Informa- 

 tion of shipments East you will see that in the last month or six weeks 

 of these shipments car upon car was piled into the cities of New York 

 and Boston on top of ours, while Philadelphia, Cleveland, Pittsburg, 

 Buffalo, St. Louis, Milwaukee, and many other places were almost 

 entirely bare of fruit. They piled into the City of New York forty or 

 fifty carloads per week. 



The object of those in control of the Fruit Growers and Shippers' 

 Association in concentrating its shipments in the cities of New York 

 and Boston is obvious, therefore not difficult to understand, for it had 

 but one meaning, which was to glut these markets to the end that low 

 prices might prevail, and thereby cause losses to the independent ship- 

 pers; and yet our shipments brought good* prices, and better than the 

 shipments made through their association by growers of our locality. 

 On one day, in the City of Boston, one firm sold four cars, and obtained 

 only $614 for one of them, and there was but one of the four that brought 

 $700. It does not take much calculation to show you how much the 

 grower lost, for he was out not only his fruit, but also his labor and 

 packages. I understand that one of the gentlemen, who is a power in 

 the association, when he heard of the low prices received, said that he 



