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OFFICIAL REPORT OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



would be useless to hope to control the price of prunes, for instance, if 

 more than twenty-five per cent of the crop of the Coast were permitted 

 to be offered in competition with the association's crop. 



Third — Do not at the beginning ask the farmer to subscribe large 

 sums of money for any purpose. First prove your ability to make a 

 success of the business, and then he will subscribe if you find it neces- 

 sary to ask him. This, I think, was the mistake made last summer in 

 the attempt to organize the deciduous fruit-growers. When you have 

 absolute control of the crop you will find business men falling over 

 each other to finance and handle it for you. Get control of the crop 

 first; do it at once; don't wait until the crop is almost ready for pick- 

 ing before you begin this important work, and even if you do not suc- 

 ceed in making such arrangements as you wish the first year, you will 

 be all the better prepared to try again the following year, and in any 

 event you will be much stronger with an organization than without it. 

 One of the greatest difficulties we had to contend with in the raisin 

 industry was to convince the grower that if he would cut loose from the 

 packer and commission man, we could help him to secure advances on 

 his crop ; but he quickly found that as soon as the title of seventy-five 

 per cent of the raisin crop of the State, even before it was grown, was 

 vested in the association, the banks were quite willing to cash the 

 growers' drafts on the association to a reasonable amount, payable out 

 of the proceeds of the crops when sold. 



Fourth — This, although the last of the four essentials I desire to 

 bring to your notice, is the most important of all: it is the campaign of 

 organization. You will find among the mass of farmers, and especially 

 among those who have been fairly successful, an apathy; a dense, 

 dogged indifference; an incapacity to grasp the possibilities or probabili- 

 ties of the future; a narrow, all-prevailing suspicion that you have an 

 ax of your own to grind, that is extremely discouraging. Those of you, 

 however, who realize how much time is at stake, how great the loss will 

 be if matters are allowed to proceed as in the past, and how great the 

 gain to all individual interests and to the State at large, if the fruit 

 farmers of California can be induced to organize, should take this matter 

 in hand with the firm determination to win. Much labor will be neces- 

 sary, and there should be thorough organization to carry on the work. 

 Let it be taken in hand on the same lines as those of a political cam- 

 paign, with press bureau, men of influence to address meetings of 

 growers at the principal centers, and active workers holding meetings 

 at all the schoolhouses in the fruit-growing districts. In this way you 

 can succeed; without it, you will be wasting your time in trying. 

 Surely the reward is worth the effort, and I can imagine no more 

 inspiring and noble work than to bring overflowing prosperity to this 

 earthly paradise— California. 



