ii6 



of apples tied up. The result of thist co-operation was that the 

 apple prices sprung from $2.25 and $2.50 to $3.00 and $4.00, al- 

 though the two organizations really controlled very Httle fruit. 



You gentlemen are very much interested in spray materials at 

 this time. I found you talking exactly like our own people talk. 

 One gentleman was asking the price of some brand of material. 

 Another was asking what his neighbor was going to pay for ''Scale- 

 cide." Another one what his spray machinery was going to cost. 

 So many people talking about the price of things and so few 

 about the value of things. I wish our people would talk more about 

 the value of things and less about the price. Fruit growing is not 

 a cheap man's job. Why could not an organization help us in 

 buying our spray material and machines. 



One of the things all of us of this section need most, is the 

 co-operation of an organization that will confine us to a standard 

 pack. Let us forget that we are going to sell this fruit at all. Get 

 up a series of co-operative organizations. Have delegates of every 

 organization meet together and decide what the apple pack would be. 



Down in Virginia the apple buyers come from New Orleans and 

 New York. Ten or fifteen were there in one season. Six were there 

 yet when I left on Tuesday, of this week. One man came bring- 

 ing five or six men with him and planning to hire fifteen or twenty 

 more. Before we knevv^ it he had picked up six, eight or ten of our 

 best workmen, and boomed the price of our labor. It has gotten 

 so now that it is difficult to get experienced help because these 

 apple buyers pick them all up. An efficient organization could own 

 or at least help this situation. 



I believe I am the only growxr in Frederick county who does 

 not have a man representing the buyer come in his orchard to 

 superintend the packing. Under no circumstances will I have an- 

 other man to come in my orchard to superintend my work. So 

 far as I know, every man in the country permits a buyer's repre- 

 sentative do this work. Please consider that these questions have 

 nothing to do with the price. Forget price for the moment and 

 remember that if we grow the right sort of fruit and put it up 

 right it will sell itself. 



We know what a tremendous development in fruit growing is 

 taking place out in the Pacific Northwest. It may be a great deal 

 bigger from this point than if we were out there, but we know 

 something about the character of their fruit, and the only thing 

 that makes fruit growing possible in that country is the close ef- 

 fective organization they have perfected. 



The object is to put the small fruit grower on the same level 

 with the large one, and by combining to standardize the packing 

 and grading of fruit. I am quite sure that there is no sort of dis- 

 position on the part of any of our people large or small, to be jeal- 

 ous. W^e should get together for the one purpose of standardizing 

 fruit packing and packages of this whole eastern country, and you 

 can't help but succeed, you can't help but realize the profits from 

 such an organization. I do not know anything that has so injured 

 the fruit business as the disposition, not only of the growers, but 



