134 LOCAL ORGANIZATIONS AND THEIR POSSIBILITIES 



"A new market shelter was built in our city this past year, and I 

 think our Association saved us five to ten dollars eaph on our market 

 table or stall. Our tables are twelve feet long, and the Hall and 

 Market committee, after meeting with the members of our Asso- 

 ciation, fixed the minimum price of our tables at fifteen to twenty 

 dollars per year. Butchers without an organization and with an 

 eight foot table were charged a minimum of forty dollars." 



Market facilities can be modified. At Cleveland they were 

 unable to get the market they wanted, but they couldn't quite agree 

 on a general market enterprise. They did agree, however, to hire 

 a building. This they did, and they placed in it a man in whom they 

 have confidence, and that man handles their produce individually 

 at ten per cent commission. 



LEGISLATION 



The Boston growers had great difficulty with boards of health 

 about hauling manure through the streets. They observed proper 

 precautions, but some of the boards said, "You shall not haul manure 

 through our streets, except at night." They objected, and they got 

 what they wanted. They soon had a reputation for "hard fighting" 

 and they were usually able to control the situation. A letter puts it 

 thus: 



"These are a few sample cases of what we have to contend with 

 here, and our Association is gaining a reputation for hard fighting, 

 so that the authorities are beginning to think twice before they 

 trouble the farmers about here now. As one clerk of the Board of 

 Health said in speaking to the clerk of the State Board about a 

 regulation they wanted them to pass, Tf you touch one farmer, you 

 touch the whole ^Association and they fight.' " 



Near Chicago a group of growers has been able to secure legisla- 

 tion to prevent the flooding of their lands with water that was coming 

 from outside. In another place the taxes were reduced by eight or 

 ten dollars per acre. 



EXPERIMENTATION 



The Massachusetts Asparagus Growers' Association was organ- 

 ized for the purpose of finding out how to avoid trouble with 

 asparagus rust. Their difficulties have been reduced very mater- 

 ially, although many a man would go there and say, "These 

 experimenters have been working for years. What have they 

 done?" The following quotation states the case concisely: 



