June 15 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
4i8 
FARMERS AND FARM FIRE INSURANCE. 
Discriminations in Favor of Village Property. 
It is true that the insurance companies, some of 
them at least, arc not anxious for farm property 
risks, and under their system of doing business I am 
not surprised. As I understand it, they depend upon 
agents chiefly to extend their business and make col¬ 
lections, the agents getting a liberal percentage on 
the money taken. Under this system the higher the 
valuation allowed on a building the greater the 
agent’s fee, so there is the constant temptation on 
his part to value property for all it is worth, or even 
more. Provided the buildings are not burned the 
greater is the profit to both the company and the 
agent. When insurance is undertaken by the Grange 
I understand that only members of the order are ad¬ 
mitted to the privilege, and as the members are all 
known to one another the risks are much less on the 
average than where the insured are unknown, as is 
the case with the officers of the regular companies, 
except the local agents who, as intimated, may be 
over-tempted to allow high values on the property 
insured. So far as 1 have learned the Grange insur¬ 
ance business thus far has been generally satisfactory 
to the members. They have saved money by their 
plan. Of course you know that insurance men are 
not doing business for either fun or charity, but to 
make money for themselves. So-called “mutual ’ com¬ 
panies are mutual to a degree only, as the officers 
have control of rules, rates and the size of their own 
salaries. I know of one agent, an assessor, who has 
often been asked by patrons when on his rounds, 
whether he was valuing the property as assessor or 
insurance agent? I am satisfied in my own mind that 
no building should ever be insured for a higher sum 
than it is taxed for. An insurance officer tells me 
that he dislikes farm property in this 
section because the business of farming 
is on the decline, and the property is 
constantly diminishing in value, so that 
the “moral risk ’ is too great. When a 
farm becomes unsalable and the build¬ 
ings are insured for more than the en¬ 
tire property will readily bring the 
temptation to be careless about fires is 
too great. A really dishonest man may 
have it in his power to “unload” upon 
the insurance company at better rates 
than he could get in the real estate 
market or at private sale. 
Insurance offices and officers are al¬ 
most invariably located in cities or large 
towns, and in many portions of New 
England real estate is gradually rising 
in these, while in the strictly rural por¬ 
tions it is as gradually diminishing in 
its value. The farmers, as they view it, 
contena that the people of the cities and 
towns are partly to blame for this con¬ 
dition, as the laws are made to favor the 
cities. In most of the cities and large 
villages now the people are supplied with water under 
pressure, and have fire engines and other improved 
methods for controlling fires, so that insurance com¬ 
panies feel that the risk is much less than back in 
the country, where if a fire gets started it generally 
finishes the buildings, leaving little besides the cellar 
and well. It is not a little aggravating to farmers 
in the outskirts of a town to be charged higher rates 
for insurance than is charged on center of town prop¬ 
erty, when they have been taxed heavily to help pay 
for village water works, fire engines and firemen’s 
salaries. Again, when they see an insurance officer 
in the center of the town receiving an annual salary 
for keeping the company books equal to or exceeding 
the value of a good farm in the country they cannot 
be blamed for looking about to see whether the in¬ 
surance business cannot be run on a more economical 
scale. The Grange people, meeting together as they 
do every week or fortnight, can transact their insur¬ 
ance business at much less expense than is usual, 
when the work is done by agents who travel about 
the country soliciting business and often depending 
upon their commissions for a living. The members 
of the Grange, too, are, as a rule, rather a select class. 
They are more intelligent, more enterprising and less 
inclined to be careless in the care and management 
of their business If this is true the risk on members’ 
property would be less than on the general average, 
but insurance companies could hardly be expected to 
make distinctions in rates on these grounds. I do 
not know what responsibilities the State Grange has 
assumed by taking on the business of an old company. 
But T do believe that the organization can do an in¬ 
surance business for its own members at a saving on 
the usual rates. It has already been done, which is 
pretty good proof. A. w. cheever. 
Massachusetts. 
Insurance by the Massachusetts State Grange. 
We insure farm property that is owned by members 
of the Grange and no other farm risks will be taken. 
We believe in the long run that we shall get a better 
edass of risks by this method, and we desire to en¬ 
courage farmers to join our order. We insure noth¬ 
ing but private dwellings and private barns and 
Grange halls, and contents of each of the foregoing. 
We insure dwellings and private barns other than 
farm property, whether the owner belongs to the 
Grange or not. I am aw’are that there is much truth 
in the claim of old-line companies in regard to ex¬ 
cessive losses on farm property, but we believe that 
a careful selection of risks will enable us to overcome 
some of the difficulty. As one who has had consider¬ 
able experience in the fire insurance business, I will 
say that one thing we most need is honesty of pur¬ 
pose by property owners. Too many cry up values to 
insurance agents and cry them away down to asses¬ 
sors. A law that would permit no man to insure his 
property for more than what he was willing to pay 
taxes on would be a feature which would tend to 
place more responsibility on property owners. Some¬ 
thing must be done for the farmers in this matter of 
insurance, as rates are increasing to very high fig¬ 
ures v/ith lower dividends due to shorter terms, and 
many companies absolutely decline the property. The 
oldest company in our State (the Worcester Mutual) 
built up its business on farm property, but now de¬ 
clines to take a single new risk in that class, and is 
dropping many of its old patrons, either entirely or 
by dividing the amount with some other company. 
We hope the effort may be a successful one, and in 
any case do not see how our farmers can be any worse 
off with us than with others, and they may be much 
better. wm. a. iiow.utD. 
Sec. Mass. State Grange. 
EDUCATING PURCHASERS AND CONSUMERS 
We read a great deal in different papers about edu¬ 
cating the farmer as to the proper manner of market¬ 
ing his produce. Advice, in copious doses, is given 
as to how he should sort and clean his eggs; as to the 
proper manner of making, coloring and packing his 
butter; he is told that he should keep the small pota¬ 
toes, the knotty apples, the inferior fruits and vege¬ 
tables of all kinds at home, and thus receive more 
for the selected specimens than he would otherwise 
for the whole. One good thing about this advice is 
that it is cheap. To look at the produce that comes 
into the New York and other markets one can’t help 
but feel that it is needed. But another class sadly 
needs advice, also, and that is the purchasers and 
consumers. While there is a demand, and I think an 
increasing demand for choice products, nicely and at¬ 
tractively packed, the majority of buyers are not 
yet educated to the point where they are willing to 
pay enough more for them to pay the shipper for the 
extra labor involved. This may be heresy, but it is 
the truth nevertheless. I don’t advocate this careless 
assorting and packing, but I wish to present the other 
side of the question, and show that two parties need 
educating and not one as is generally supposed. I 
have seen buyer after buyer pay 25 to 50 cents per 
barrel less for a barrel of poorly-assorted, inferior 
fruit than he could have obtained choice fruit for. The 
extra quarter or half dollar looked so big to him that 
it shut out all appreciation of the difference in qual¬ 
ity. Yet the best fruit was really the cheapest. 1 
have seen buyers haggle over the price of a really su¬ 
perior article, claiming that they could get one “just 
as good” elsewhere at a lower price; and then failing 
to accomplish their object return and pay the price 
demanded, thus belying the former assertions. 'Phe 
education needed here is evidently in the matter of 
truth telling rather than in appreciation of quality. 
Instances innumerable have been noted among the 
commission houses where produce of all kinds put up 
in good shape, and of superior quality, has not sold 
for enough more to pay for the extra labor involved. 
This is not because the commission merchant doesn’t 
appreciate the extra value, but because the purchasers 
do not. Some commission men have worked up a 
trade that pays well for these choice products; many 
have not. The grower of fine produce must shun the 
latter and find the former. 
I know of a shrewd Jerseyman who for years has 
shipped his large crop of potatoes to the New York 
market just as he dug them from the ground, little 
and big. When his commission merchant protests, 
he simply says: “Sell them enough cheaper to satisfy 
the buyer; I can’t afford to sort them.” He has 
learned that he gets more dollars from the class to 
whom he sells by following this practice. I know of 
two celery growers who had about equal areas of 
celery. One of them sorted out and threw away hun¬ 
dreds of dozens of rusted, slightly rotted and inferior 
roots; the other threw away nothing unless it was so 
bad that he couldn’t hide it in the middle of a bunch. 
The same commission merchant sold both lots. The 
last mentioned grower received considerably less per 
dozen, but he had more dollars when all was sold. 1 
know of a Michigan farmer who shipped beans to 
New York so dirty and full of worthless beans that 
one would think them unsalable. Yet they sold for 
only 15 to 25 cents per bushel less than they would 
have brought had they been thoroughly cleaned, not 
enough to pay for the loss in cleaning, not to speak 
of the labor. Similar instances might be multiplied 
indefinitely. Yet there is another phase of this sub¬ 
ject that may perhaps excuse the purchasers some¬ 
what. Some dishonest shippers have practiced de¬ 
ception in packing. A barrel faced with fine large 
Spy or King apples has been found to contain inferior 
fruit of perhaps half a dozen varieties in the middle. 
A barrel of potatoes of large size amd beautiful ap¬ 
pearance on top are half small, wormeaten and worth¬ 
less in the middle. So with many products. Pur¬ 
chasers have been deceived so much that they con¬ 
clude to purchase the lowest-priced thinking that they 
will thus lose less. Some fruit dealers, too, prefer to 
buy unassorted fruit, and assort and 
pack it to suit their trade. They !nal;c 
a fine margin by so doing. The whole 
matter in a nutshell is, that those who 
put their first-class products in fancy 
shape must find a market where the 
purchasers have been educated to the 
proper point, in order to get proper re¬ 
turns for their labor. What is needed 
is not less education for the farmers, 
but more for the purchasers, e. n. 
INDIANA FANM NOTES. 
ORANGE SORGHUM.—At Sheridan, 
Ind., the other day I called on George 
Symons, who has 55 acres of sorghum 
planted. He makes the best molasses 
in this section, and cannot near fill the 
demand. I was surprised to learn that 
he does not like the Orange cane. He 
uses the Honeydew. He claims that he 
has made up and compared tons again 
and again, and that the Honeydew will 
yield a third more molasses on an aver¬ 
age. It also has a habit of stooling. This is not 
suckering, but stooling, like wheat. I asked whether 
the stooling stalks will ripen as soon as the central 
and parent stalk. He said that there is practically no 
difference; it sometimes makes it too thick and small, 
and it shoulo be planted thin. This variety does not 
lodge worse than the Orange, and it does not have 
red cracked hearts so badly, and is not affected as 
much by rains just before ripening. It does not get 
as ropy; is clear of that tartish taste, can stand long¬ 
er without cutting and will lie in the pile longer with¬ 
out souring. It seems that it has all the good quali¬ 
ties in one variety. Mr. Symons found it too expen¬ 
sive last year to strip it, and fed it through whole. 
BAGASSE FOR SILAGE.—While talking he asked 
whether I thought the bagasse would keep in the silo. 
I said that if it were cut and carefully packed it 
would, but if piled in whole it would sour. He said 
that he had a plan in view of arranging for patrons 
having dairies or feeding steers to grow a field of 
sorghum, bring it to him, and have it milled and run 
on to a wagon and taken direct to the silo on the 
patron’s farm. This would be getting a double crop 
from it. It would certainly be rich feed even after 
milling. All feeds containing much sweets or starch 
are hard to keep in a silo without souring, unless put 
in in a fine condition and tramped well. Then they 
keep as well as other feeds. Cattle eat the bagasse 
well now, but it is coarse and rough on the mouth; 
also very mean to handle. If one had the ropy stuff 
packed in a silo it would be hard to feed. 
K. H. COIXIIfS. 
As to stock of any kind being poisoned by eating grass 
in an orchard where Bordeaux Mixture or Paris-green 
has been used. I have never known of such a case; do 
not think there has ever been one In this locality. I have 
sprayed my orchard this Spring with Bordeaux and ar¬ 
senic, making it very strong of tne arsenic; had hogs In 
the orchard all the time, and cattle just a few days after 
t he spraying. No harm has resulted. *"• k. v. ». 
Stanley, N. Y. 
EULALIA JAPONICA VAR GRACILLIMA. Fig, 171. See Page 422 
