146 
AMERICAN POMOEOGICAE SOCIETY 
President Goodman: Before hearing Mr. Leffingw ell’s lecture on the 
glorious Pacific Coast. I want to announce that the state vice-presidents 
will meet to-morrow morning in Room 45. If your state vice-president is 
not here and you are the only one representing your state, you come to 
the meeting. If there are two of you, you agree which one shall be your 
representative or delegate, and you be at that meeting which is for the 
purpose of nominating our officers for another biennium. 
Are we going to have the report from our team contest? Did the com- 
mittee get through? We want to award this trophy if you are ready; if 
our friends on the committee will let us know whether or not we — are to be 
relieved of our suspense and our doubts we shall be grateful. I sup- 
pose many of you do not understand what this team contest is. There are 
eight state universities or state agricultural colleges which have sent here 
teams of three boys each, to judge fruits. These boys have scored every 
apple as to size, form, color and condition, on fifty plates, five apples each. 
They have tried to identify the several varieties in the test, some seventeen, 
and have made a score-card for each plate. The team which makes the best 
score, covering identification, placing and scoring, will be awarded a beauti- 
ful cup, and the other two teams will be given silver and bronze Wilder 
medals as prizes. We have had hopes that we might have a report from that 
committee, Mr. Close, Mr. Taft and Mr. Macoun, at this time; but if the data 
is not made up we shall need to wait until tomorrow. 
These boys have certainly done some splendid work. I tried to plead 
for the boys two or three times, by asking the judges not to be quite so 
severe; not to give them too severe a task — because really some of the 
problems set out in this contest are worthy of the effort of us experimenters 
and horticulturists as gray as we are. But they made up their scheme and 
changed the apples, and mixed the varieties, and these boys had to hunt them 
out and make their decision. 
Secretary Lake: The committee is prepared to make the announce- 
ment Mr. President, as soon as they have attached the names to the scores. 
President Goodman: Well, we will wait a few minutes because, I 1 tell 
you right now, some boys in this audience are very uneasy. Just think, 
eight state institutions represented here, with three boys from each institu- 
tion, and some of them had two or three extra ones along, so that if any- 
thing happened they would be ready to call a substitute into action. And 
so there have been about thirty or forty boys that have been on their mettle 
for twenty-four hours, and they are very, very anxious to have this report. 
I suppose most of you, or some of you, have a knowledge in a general way 
of a few of the fruits, and of our more common apples — you know a Winesap, 
or a Jonathan, or a Baldwin. But I wonder how many know the difference 
in texture of these apples? and when you buy an apple how many know 
what variety of an apple it Is. It is really worth while to know the import- 
ant characteristics of an apple. I wonder how many of you know which 
way the seeds in an apple point — toward the stem end or toward the blossom 
end? or how do you tell whether an apple is a Rhode Island Greening, a 
Yellow Newtown or an Esopus? Until you do know these things you never 
really appreciate an apple. 
Here comes Professor Close, chairman of the committee; let us hear from 
him. I am all of a quiver in my anxiety to hear from the committee which 
