PROCEEDINGS OF THIRTY-SIXTH FRUIT-GROWERS ' CONVENTION. 



9 



ore-hard. We have the soil, the elimate, the favorable conditions to 

 produce in this section of the world the best fruit that can be produced 

 anywhere, and questions will arise which are very important. We can 

 not grow the fruit without a struggle against nature and against the 

 pests. We can not grow fruit successfully unless Ave have organized 

 together for the purpose of getting it into the market to the best 

 advantage, and you can not raise fruit successfully and feed this 

 country and Europe unless you have good transportation, both in the 

 cars which you use and the rates which you have to pay. So. the ques- 

 tion of fighting the pests, the question of forming associations to market 

 the product, the question of getting good and cheap transportation, are 

 the great questions that the people of this State engaged in fruit raising 

 will be confronted with, and you must settle them. 



I don't know whether any of you have visited the insectary built a 

 short time ago in your Capitol grounds at Sacramento; if you have not, 

 come there and see the work being done by the Horticultural Commis- 

 sion, the study being made there every day by those in charge, discover- 

 ing the insect that will destroy the pests that infest our orchards. It 

 is a most interesting study ; it is growing all the time and should have 

 the hearty support, as I suppose it has. of all the fruit growers of this 

 State. 



Another thing which I am satisfied you are all thinking about. It is 

 very important that there should be an association by which the fruit 

 of California can be intelligently handled and marketed. You can not 

 take your fruit and dump it in the East and expect to realize much if it 

 goes there by chance. You have got to handle it carefully ; you have got 

 to control the market ; you have got to work with each other and not 

 one against another. (Applause.) That seems to be the modern wav 

 of doing business. If you were in the shingle business in Humboldt 

 County you would do it ; if you went into the copper business you would 

 do it : if you went into mining you would do it ; if you were operating 

 railroads you would do it ; and I know of no reason why the farmers of 

 the country that are producing the product that makes great wealth 

 should not realize this great principle of business and get together and 

 handle the product, and not see it wasted after it leaves your hands and 

 is put on board the cars. 



Another thing of great importance, which I keep driving at con- 

 tinually and all the time and never stop, would be the question of 

 transportation. I would insist to the companies that are coming to 

 California with their roads and making wealth here, that they should 

 provide you people with the very best cars that can be manufactured 

 for the purpose of safely and carefully carrying your fruits to the 

 markets of the world, and I would keep after them continually until I 

 got a rate which is fair and just. I think this question will be settled 

 largely when the Panama Canal is constructed. I believe there will be 

 a change at that time largely in the way of doing business between this 

 section of the coast and the East. When we can bring from Europe or 

 from the Atlantic coast large ships, land them here in Monterey Bay. 

 in San Francisco Bay, in San Diego and. San Pedro — in fact, in all the 

 ports along our coast, and received from your hands the dried fruits 

 which you can produce here and take them and deliver them in the 



