819 
1913. 
'FI-TIO KURAb NEW-YORKER 
NEW YORK’S CO-OPERATION AGENT. 
Marc W. Cole. 
On page 810 is a picture of Marc W. 
Cole, the man appointed by Agricultural 
Commissioner ITuson to organize the new 
department of co-operative farm society 
work. Mr. Cole says that perhaps flesh 
and furrows would make his picture 
more impressive and dignified. The new 
job may add the furrows, but. the extra 
flesh is not likely to come if Mr. Cole 
expects to get results, for co-operative 
results are ground out of a mill of hard 
work. 
Tt makes little difference where a man 
comes from or what he has done when he 
begins at the very bottom of a new job. 
We are all more concerned about where 
the man is coming-out rather than where 
he started. Some of the commission trade 
papers are blocking out a great job 
for the new department. One of them 
says: 
Mr. Cole’s career will now be watched 
with interest. 11 is original bill, had it 
become law, would have put the commis¬ 
sion merchant out of business, resulting 
in turn in heavy losses to farmers and 
shippers by closing to them present 
methods of distribution. Even with the 
drastic features of the bill eliminated, 
the new law is subject to attack on the 
ground of class legislation. . . . lie 
will travel over the State and will lec¬ 
ture to the Farmers’ Clubs and to the 
Women’s Clubs alike, pointing out meth¬ 
ods for practical co-operation. I-Ie will 
offer each a plan for solving the prob¬ 
lem of the ages—that of mixing oil and 
water or combining the seller and buyer. 
Of course these people die hard, and 
anything which might get oil and water 
to "combine will need a strong caustic 
principle to cut the oil. If the middle¬ 
men could succeed in making the public 
think that great and immediate results 
are to follow the creation of this new 
department, they would be able to dis¬ 
credit it. Their plan will be to lead 
our farmers to expect too much. Then 
after a time when in the very nature 
of the case results prove to be slow 
these middlemen want to come forward 
and say: “I told you so—co-operation is 
a fraud, and the State has wasted its 
money.” This would be a very slick 
game, and we must not let it work out. 
Let us all be patient and understand 
the situation. The idea of co-operation 
is common, and anyone, with a little 
thought, may see its advantages. Yet 
who, right now, can lay down a definite 
programme for each particular case? We 
have much information about the work 
in Europe but the social and geographical 
conditions are very different on the 
other side. The American farmers are 
very differently situated and differently 
trained from those who have been or¬ 
ganized so thoroughly in Germany or 
France. For one thing the European 
military service has given people the 
habit of combining and acting together. 
In our country there has been nothing 
since the Civil War to crowd men into 
compact groups and drill them in co¬ 
operation. In America thus far in nearly 
every case where co-operation has been 
tried it is an experiment, very few have 
reached the permanent stage and proved 
fundamental rules for organization. 
Me want to consider these things at 
the beginning of this important work in 
New 1 ork. It is foundation work and 
there must be no flash in the pan. We 
think Mr. Cole will be cautious—perhaps 
too much so—yet we all know how easy 
d is to bite off more than you can 
chew, and also what happens when you 
take such a bite. There must, however, 
b" results of some sort, and our farmers 
want to understand what is being done. 
1 hey can all help by reporting every 
co-operative society, large or small, 
which they know about. That is the first 
slop toward organizing. Get every such 
society, little and big, on the list with 
a statement of what they have to buy 
"i sell. It makes little difference where 
hue \\. Cole comes from—we want to 
see where he is coming out. 
HIE SPIRIT OF CO-OPERATION. 
er,, 1 ,, 111 ' ^-Y. is to be admired and 
com imnded tor its constant advocacy of 
co-operation, but it seems that some of 
ns correspondents are not “in the spirit.” 
7 S - '. xj mple of this occurred on page 
wheri U \n h ° 1, :‘ ter 0,1 “Infertile Eggs!” 
aiv I, ; "' iVi 1 saya: “Kffg consumers 
* 1 , ’'' 111 K mildly buncoed; however, if 
sh'irV >U lr yn>eu are getting their proper 
Then !. will not complain.”' 
, ..... ..... 
urt>er a long explanation of 
the 
comparative merits of fertile and in¬ 
fertile eggs, culminating in the conclu¬ 
sion that from a consumer’s point of view 
the one kind is practically of no more 
value than tin 1 former, he achieves the 
brilliant ethical feat embraced in this 
remarkable peroration: "If any market 
will pay more tor infertile than for fer¬ 
tile eggs, by all means work it, and 
work it hard.” Perhaps this is mild 
banter, but if it is not, your corres¬ 
pondent needs to be converted to your 
editorial policy of co-operation. The 
same number of your paper has a dis¬ 
cussion of the failure of co-operation in 
Decatur, Illinois. One of the reasons 
for this failure, I understand, was that 
the producing farmers (cajoled by 
agents of the commission men) began 
to sell their stuff for the same prices 
as the merchants who bought their pro¬ 
duce from the commission houses. In 
other words, they allowed their cupidity 
to be played upon. Here was a chance 
to prey upon the innocent and helpless 
consumer, and they worked it, and work¬ 
ed it. hard, and that helped the "collapse 
of attempted co-operation in Decatur. 
Any plan of co-operation that is to be 
successful must have the support of 
tli(> consumer, and any scheme that 
suggests to him that he is going to be 
made pay as much as lie" will stand for 
and not merely what the produce plus 
a reasonable return for service is worth 
—any such scheme, we say, will alienate 
the consumer. If the consumer .gets the 
impression that the farmer is as ready 
to milk” him as the middleman there 
is no hope of successful co-operation. 
( diio. CARt, G. PETRr. 
II. N.-\ r .—Of course our friend realizes 
that if any consumers really believe that 
* he infertile eggs are worth more and 
are ready to pay the extra price poultry- 
men are justified in “working” or patron¬ 
izing that market. There is no deception 
about it if the consumer really wants the 
goods. —---- 
EVENTS OF THE WEEK 
DOMESTIC.—Twenty persons are be- 
lieved to be dead in and near Tallahas¬ 
see, Fla., as a result of a tornado which 
swept that section June IS. Uncon¬ 
firmed reports from the coast are that 
many persons were drowned on the Flor¬ 
ida Keys. Fishermen and others say 
that a terrific swell passed over the low 
marsh grass islands and that a consider¬ 
able amount of wreckage has floated to 
the coast. Crops suffered heavily. Cot¬ 
ton practically is ruined. Much live 
stock was killed or maimed. 
The words “guaranteed under the food 
and drugs act” on a label are no assur¬ 
ance that tin' contents of a package m*g 
pure, according to Dr. Carl E. Alsberg, 
chief of the Bureau of Chemistry, who 
spoke at Mobile, June 18, before the As¬ 
sociation of American Food, Dairy and 
Drug Officials. Dr. Alsberg explained 
that the word "guaranteed” on a can of 
soup or a bottle of nerve tonic did not 
mean that the Bureau of Chemistry had 
seen and analyzed it, but that the manu¬ 
facturers put it on simply with the idea 
of protecting the jobber or retailer. All 
that the guarantee legend does, he con¬ 
tinued, is to make it possible to prose¬ 
cute the manufacturer if the goods are 
found to be in violation of the food and 
drugs act. 
To protect wav secrets involved in na¬ 
val ordnance manufactured under private 
contract, the government will vigorously 
prosecute the injunction suit instituted 
at Brooklyn to restrain the E. W. Bliss 
Company from exhibiting or selling to 
foreign countries, especially to the White- 
head Company of Great Britain, torpe¬ 
does similar to those made for our navy. 
Officials say that the “turbine torpedo.” 
propelled by balanced turbines revolving 
in opposite directions, was developed 
jointly by the Bureau of Ordnance and 
the Bliss Company, and that it would 
be impossible to separate the govern¬ 
ment’s patents from the company’s. 
At a conference with the members of 
the State Railroad and Warehouse Com¬ 
mission at St. Paul, June 20, represen¬ 
tatives of the railroads affected by the 
Minnesota rate case decision agreed to 
P u t into effect, as soon as possible, the 
State rates declared valid by the Supreme 
Court. These include the two-cent pas¬ 
senger rate, the merchandise schedule and 
the commodity freight rate, enacted by 
the Legislature, but never put into effect 
because of injunction proceedings. The 
railroads will agree to pay refunds due 
shippers for overcharges in the period 
in which the State rates were enjoined. 
This will amount to approximately 
$3,000,000. 
’The ascent of the highest peak of 
Mount McKinley was accomplished for 
the first time on June 7, when the party 
led by Archdeacon Hudson Stuck, Epis¬ 
copal missionary for Alaska, accom¬ 
panied by Robert G. Tatum, Harry P. 
Karstens and Walter Harper, reached 
the top of the south peak of the moun¬ 
tain. the highest on the continent. Dr. 
Stuck and his assistants erected a six- 
foot cross on the summit of the great 
mountain. Observations made with the 
mercurial barometer indicate the height 
of the mountain is 20,500 feet. The 
party found much evidence of seismic 
disturbances on the upper ridges. The 
upper basin shows evidence of a violent 
upheaval and the ridges are badly shat¬ 
tered, but the summits are not marred. 
Archdeacon Stuck confirmed the ascent 
ot the north peak by Thomas Lloyd and 
three companions in 1010, being able 
with field glasses to see the flagstaff 
erected by the Lloyd party. 
The' whirlpool rapids of Niagara took 
two mores lives June 22, when Donald 
Itosco, aged 0 years, and Hubert Moore, 
aged 11 years, drifted into them in a 
boat in which they had been playing near 
tin 1 shore a half mile or so up the gorge. 
Elliott Thompson, a -boy 12 years old, 
was also in the boat, but as he realized 
that to stick to the boat meant death in 
the rapids he bade his little friends, who 
could not swim, good-bye, leaped out 
and succeeded in reaching the shore. 
Nine members of a Government sur¬ 
veying party of fourteen men were 
drowned in the Mississippi River June 
22 when a sudden squall capsized the 
survey boat Beaver near Hodgkiss Light, 
in Snaky Bend, near New Madrid, Mo. 
< ine hundred persons were injured, one 
probably fatally at Cuylerville, N. Y., 
June 22, when four cars of a Pennsyl¬ 
vania excursion train jumped the track 
at a curve. A broken truck bolt on the 
tender of the engine is blamed for the 
accident. The train was making 25 miles 
an hour. The tender left the track and 
carried the smoker with it. They plowed 
the ties for 150 feet before going over 
the embankment. Three other passenger 
cars followed the smoker, each leaving 
the track and turning over down the em¬ 
bankment. which is about 10 feet high. 
A wreck on the New Haven Railroad 
at Canaan, Conn., June 23, injured nine 
persons, one fatally. The wreck was due 
to the lack of a flagman to warn a com¬ 
ing freight. At the time it happened 
officials of the road were being questioned 
at the inquest following the fatal wreck 
at Stamford 11 days before. 
Fifteen men and a boy are known to be 
dead, more than 60 were injured, some 
fatally, and IS are unaccounted for as 
the result of an explosion late June 24 
in the elevator and grain storehouse of the 
I l usted Milling Company, Buffalo, N. 1\ 
Fire followed the explosion and destroyed 
the wooden section of the elevator. The 
loss is estimated at $500,000. The explo¬ 
sion was caused by the puffing of dust 
accumulations in the feedhouse, and was 
of frightful force, tearing out the north 
wall of the wooden structure and break¬ 
ing windows for a quarter of a mile 
around. 
WASHINGTON.—Following are the 
main provisions of the Administration’s 
currency bill: It creates a Federal Re¬ 
serve Board consisting of nine members, 
three of whom are to be chosen by the 
President, with the consent of the' Sen¬ 
ate, and three by the Federal reserve 
banks, the other three to be the Secretary 
of the Treasury, the Secretarv of Agri¬ 
culture and the Comptroller of the Cur¬ 
rency, as ex-officio members. This board 
is empowered to divide the United States 
into twelve districts, with a Federal re¬ 
serve bank in each, having a paid up, un¬ 
impaired capital of at least $5,000,000, 
each national bank in the district con¬ 
tributing 20 per cent of its paid up capi¬ 
tal. Each Federal reserve bank is to 
have nine directors, three of them to be 
designated by the central controlling or¬ 
ganization, three to represent the stock 
holding banks and three who must not be 
connected with any bank, to represent 
the agricultural, commercial and indus¬ 
trial interests of the district. The bill 
authorizes a $500,000,000 issue of treas¬ 
ury notes which the Federal reserve 
banks can call for on depositing collateral 
in the shape of notes and bills offered to 
them for rediscount by member banks. 
They must keep in their vaults a reserve 
deposit of 33 1-3 per cent of the treasury 
notes in their hands. 
The law requiring national bank asso¬ 
ciations to deliver a certain amount of 
United States registered bonds to the 
Treasury of the United States before en¬ 
tering into banking business is repealed. 
FARM AND GARDEN.—Victor H. 
Olmsted, chief of the Bureau of Statis¬ 
tics of the Department of Agriculture, 
was suspended June IS by Secretary 
Houston pending an inquiry into 
charges of lack of discipline and poor ad¬ 
ministration in the bureau. It was offi¬ 
cially stated that there was no suspicion 
of leaks in crop reports, similar to the 
famous “cotton leak” a few years ago. 
The solicitor of the department has 
started an investigation. To avoid any 
suspicion of collusion Secretary Houston 
decided it would be better for Mr. Olm¬ 
sted to be out of office during the inquiry. 
The investigation is likely to result, it 
was suggested by an official of the de¬ 
partment, in the transfer of the entire 
Bureau of Statistics to the Census Bu¬ 
reau, which specializes in such work. 
Another consignment .of Argentine 
beef arrived at New York June 21 on the 
W hite Star steamer Celtic, sailing from 
Liverpool. It was for sale at one cent 
and a half a pound below the prevailing 
price of domestic beef. The beef is being 
shipped by an English syndicate, which 
desires to see if this country has a mar¬ 
ket for chilled or frozen beef. The con¬ 
signment consists of about twenty thous¬ 
and pounds of beef, and is being handled 
by a large commission merchant in the 
Produce Exchange Building. This is the 
second shipment of Argentine beef. The 
first sold remarkably well. The shipper 
says as soon as the tariff is taken off 
foreign beef Argentine meat will be 
shipped direct. 
Gov. Cox, of Ohio, has appointed the 
following members of the new State 
Agricultural Commission: A. P. San¬ 
dies, secretary of the State Board of 
Agriculture; S. E. Strode, State Dairy 
and Food Commissioner; Homer C. 
Price, dean of the State College of Agtl- 
culture. 
THE UNDERWOOD BILL. —The 
Underwood tariff bill as changed by the 
Finance Committee of the Senate was 
laid before the Democratic caucus of the 
members of the Upper House June 20. 
The Senate Committee has made many 
and important changes in the Under¬ 
wood measure, but in none of these have 
the big general principles urged by Presi¬ 
dent Wilson been turned down. The bill 
now submitted to the Democrats of the 
Senate for action will yield between 
$5,000,000 and $6,000,000 net in excess 
of the total that would flow from the 
measure as it came from the House. On 
the whole, however, the rates in the bill 
now are. at a lower average than the 
average in the Underwood measure. The 
increase in revenue has been brought 
about through the imposition of a tax of 
five cents a bunch on bananas and 
through the restoration of a tax on 
brandy used in the fortification of pure 
sweet wines in the domestic industry. 
Exception is made under the existing 
laws to brandy used in this way, so that 
it is at present yielding internal revenue 
at the rate of only three cents a gallon. 
The amendment inserted by the Senate 
Committee repeals this exception and re¬ 
stores the regular tax of $1.10 a gallon. 
It is estimated that this alone will yield 
$7,000,000 a year and that the tax on 
bananas will bring in an additional 
$2,500,000. The reductions made bv the 
Senate Committee will have a net gain 
of about $5,000,000 over the House bill. 
The income tax provisions in the tariff 
bill agreed upon up to this time by the 
Senate Democrats makes bachelors pay 
a tax on all net income above $3,000. 
The House was kinder to the celibates. 
The bill it passed allowed an exemption 
up to $4,000. The Democrats on the 
Senate Finance Committee decided - also 
to tax the separate incomes of both hus¬ 
band and wife. The House recognized 
but one special taxpayer at the head of a 
family. The most fortunate among this 
class of probable special taxpayers would 
be the husband who supports a wife and 
two or more children. He would be ex¬ 
empted up to $5,000. He would get 
$3,000 exemption in his own right, the 
fiat exemption allowed all special income 
taxpayers under the law. Then he would 
be allowed $1,000 on account of his wife 
unless she was supporting herself. He 
would get another $500 exemption for 
each of his children up to the limit of 
$1,000. If the wife was enjoying an in¬ 
dependent income in excess of $3,000 she 
would be required to pay upon it regard¬ 
less of what her husband might pay. 
Canadian Fruit Report. 
From present appearances the apple 
crop will be nearly as large as last year. 
Some damage by late frost and drought is 
reported. 
Bears will be a medium crop—not so 
large as last year, except in British 
Columbia. 
Plums were seriously injured by frost 
The yield will not be over half of nor¬ 
mal. 
The large commercial peach orchards 
promise good crops. The scattered 
plantings outside the regular peach belt 
are very poor. 
Grapes were somewhat injured in 
Western Ontario. The large orchards in 
the Niagara district promise well. 
Reports received 
Horticultural So< 
pects for the frui 
For the State 
Apples. 
Pears . 
Peaches ... 
Plums . 
Cherries ... 
Grapes ...., 
Strawberries 
Raspberries 
Blackberries 
by the Kansas State 
dety indicate the 
pros- 
t crop 
to be as follows: 
compared with 
the 
, 1911, 
and June, 
1912: 
June 
June 
June 
1913 
1912 
1911 
. 53 
71 
33 
66 
27 
. 26 
53 
10 
. 41 
60 
36 
. 64 
70 
63 
. 79 
73 
69 
. 70 
68 
37 
. 70 
54 
46 
. 69 
46 
54 
Tree fruits, although not showing as 
large a yield as last year, are generally 
reported in good condition. More spray¬ 
ing is being done iu the orchard than 
heretofore. Small fruits are more plen¬ 
tiful than last season, and the quality 
is reported fine where there was suffi¬ 
cient rainfall. 
WALTER WEI.I.HOUSE, SEC’Y. 
WORLD CROPS. 
The International Institute of Agri¬ 
culture reports that the estimated pro¬ 
duction of wheat this year and its per¬ 
centage of last year’s production is: in 
Bulgaria, 67,977.1X10 bushels, or 106.6 
per cent; Italy, 183.719,000 bushels, or 
110.9 per cent.; India, 358,316,000 bush¬ 
els. or 96.7 per cent.; Japan, 27,029,(XX) 
bushels, or 105.2 per cent. 
The estimated production of barley in 
Japan is 101,073,000 bushels, or 101.5 
per cent, of last year’s crop. 
The preliminary figure of production 
of flaxseed in India is 21,420.000 bushels, 
or 83.4 per cent of last year’s crop. 
The sugar beet area, compared with 
last year is, in Belgium, 84.7 per cent.; 
Denmark, 102.3; France, 94.3; Hungary 
(excluding Croatia and Slavonia), 107.8 
per cent. _ 
June 21. At Montpelier. Vt., the 
prices paid by dealers are for strictly 
fresh local eggs, 22; butter, 28; native 
beef, 7V.j to 8; lamb, 12V> ; pork, 10 to 
10 U ; fowls. 18 to 20. At Randolph, Vt., 
cord wood cut stove size, $6 to $7.50 a 
Con F % I. w. w. 
