114 TWENTY-EIGHTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



A great deal of the literature, however, lacks directness: but improve- 

 ment in this as in other things will come from experience. The average 

 inquirer wants specific information. To illustrate: Some time ago I 

 received a letter from a man in Great Falls, Montana, who said: "I 

 take the liberty of writing to you for such information as would be 

 useful to a man who contemplates settling in your State and engaging 

 in the fruit-raising business." 



I sent him ten pamphlets on ten leading fruit counties, and in my 

 letter I told him if he desired further or more specific information to 

 let me hear from him again. In due time he wrote me another letter, 

 as follows : 



I have read the pamphlets you were kind enough to send me, and I confess they are 

 interesting and rather alluring, but except the circular on "California's Climate," none 

 of them tell what I want to know. I gather that fruit land rates from $25 an acre up to 

 higher than I would care to pay. I want to know what the conditions are that attach 

 to different priced land? I would assume $50 an acre as a medium. What kind of land 

 can I buy for $50 an acre? How far would it be from market? What could I raise on it? 

 On an average, what would the crop be worth? What kind of people would I be among? 

 What would be the school facilities? Would there be a church within reach? What is 

 the cost of fencing and building material? What is the cost of living? Send me some 

 grocery man's price list. What are the prices of farm animals, horses and cows 

 particularly? I apologize for so many questions, but you see I want to know, before 

 breaking up here, just what I can do with the means I will have when I get there. 



We seldom get a letter that goes so far as this one in specific 

 inquiries, but the general tenor of correspondence that comes to us 

 indicates a desire for information more specific than is contained in the 

 general run of California literature. The party who undertakes to write 

 of California or of a county or locality should anticipate all these ques- 

 tions and all others that the inquirer is likely to ask. 



Mr. W. H. Mills, who is very practical in this line of work, as in 

 other things, evidently had in mind the wants of the average inquirer 

 for specific information when he prepared the copy for "California's 

 Industries." a pamphlet published by the Southern Pacific Company for 

 distribution at the Pan-American Exposition two years ago. This 

 pamphlet contained more of the kind of information prospective 

 settlers desire than anything that has been published on California for 

 a long time. 



California is being advertised more now and better than ever before. 

 The work, however, is yet inadequate and in many instances imperfect. 

 When it shall be done as it ought to be every portion of the world that 

 has a population from which it is desirable to recruit, will be made to 

 know our physical and climatic conditions, and the advantages which 

 this "Italy of America" offers to the settler over any other part of the 

 western hemisphere. Every scrap of literature will be prepared with a 

 special view to the purpose which it is intended to accomplish, and all 

 that is prepared and printed will be distributed so judiciously that little 



