1910. 
THE ENTIRE CONSUMER’S DOLLAR. 
How a Maine Man Captures It. 
F. L. Tibbetts is one of the comparatively few 
farmers in Maine (or in the country, for that mat¬ 
ter) who get something like a fair share of the 
consumer’s dollar. Perhaps he gets more than a 
fair share, and if he could do business through 
Uncle Sam instead of through the express com¬ 
panies he would certainly be on Easy Street. And 
it isn't because of any advantage of location, for 
Dexter is only a small village up on a branch rail¬ 
road, while Mr. Tibbetts's customers are scattered 
all over the State, and even New England. The way 
in which he got these customers is the interesting 
part of the story. 
Mrs. Tibbetts either inherited or acquired the art 
of making a particularly choice grade of domestic 
cheese. Five or six years ago she made rather more 
than she needed for family use, so she either sold 
or gave away the surplus. That started a clamor 
for more cheese, although the prospective customers 
rather balked at paying any bonus over store prices. 
At that time Mr. Tibbetts was a patron of the 
Borden condensery, and during his leisure moments 
one day, he figured it out that the store price for 
cheese did pay something over condensery prices for 
milk. Every cent counted on the farm 
then, so the next Summer they made 
more cheese than ever before. 
Some of the best samples were taken 
to the Fall fairs with such good re¬ 
sults that the next year Mr. Tibbetts 
made a big display at the Central 
Maine Fair in Walervillc. The size of 
the exhibit brought inquiries from pros¬ 
pective customers, and none of the 
cheeses was taken home. Meanwhile 
Mr. Tibbetts had learned that he had 
not been getting what the traffic would 
bear by quite a margin. That Winter 
he exhibited at the State dairy meeting 
and got a still better line on the quality 
of the Tibbetts ciieese, for by this time 
it was no longer a household side line, 
and the condensery had lost a patron. 
The next Summer the cheese business 
was pushed harder than ever, and the 
stock moved easily at 22 cents per 
pound. Still there was an accumula¬ 
tion, so when it came time for the 
Waterville fair .again, these canny 
cheese makers packed up GO beautiful 
cheeses, each weighing five pounds, 
and made another display. Better yet, 
one of the couple stood by with a 
cheese cut, and tendered samples to 
those really interested. The exhibit 
was set up at tiiree in the afternoon, 
but by 11 o’clock next day every cheese 
had been sold at $1.25 apiece, or 25 
cents per pound. Incidentally a lot of 
new customers had been acquired. 
Since then Mr. Tibbetts has had hard 
work to fill his orders as they come in. 
Every cheese is labeled with the name 
and address of the makers, so that by 
a perfectly natural process the list of 
customers continues to grow. Last, 
but not least, the price is now up to 
the point that begins to make dairying 
worth while. Some shipments have gone clear to 
Jacksonville, Florida, with the express charges col¬ 
lect, which would indicate that price was a second¬ 
ary consideration. At first Mr. Tibbetts was in¬ 
clined to enlarge his business as rapidly as possible, 
but later modified that plan. Now he is determined 
to have every branch of his business running on the 
best possible basis and look for larger profits 
through increased efficiency rather than more hard 
work. He is an active member of the local cow¬ 
testing association, and also of the Holstein Breed¬ 
ers’ Association of that county. Every year has seen 
an improvement in the herd, that sooner or later 
will be among the star business combinations in 
Maine. c. u. g. 
A DAIRY SECTION OF CALIFORNIA. 
Perhaps no animal has played a greater part in 
the civilization of the Far West than has the poor 
and lowly cow. I believe the Indians said the bee 
was ‘'the white man’s foot,” as it seemed that this 
industrious little insect was sure to be found 
wherever the early settlers located. This may be 
true in a great measure, but one thing is more cer¬ 
tain, and that is that no white man with a family 
pitched his tent or erected his humble shack in the 
THE RU RAL NEW-YORKER. 
Far West without first staking out the cow close by. 
Nearly every prairie schooner that ever crossed the 
plains or even wended its way across western 
wastes, or over snow-capped mountains, had one or 
two cows and possibly a bull calf bringing up the 
rear of the procession. Even the early missionary 
padres who came to California before other white 
folk set foot on the land are said to have had their 
herds of cattle. It is well known that when the 
missionary settlement grew under the fostering care 
of the padres, cattle were about the chief asset of 
the missions. They might well be so, for there was 
an abundant supply of grass and other native feed; 
then, the climate was conducive to the growth and 
development of stock. But the cattle of those days 
were anything but high-bred animals. They were 
mostly of the long-horned type, pretty much, I be¬ 
lieve, like many of those yet found in Texas. 
From the impetus given the stock business by the 
early missionaries and the early Argonauts, Cali¬ 
fornia soon became a great cattle-raising land. Some 
locations are better adapted to this industry than 
others. The great misfortune is that too much of 
the land has been grabbed by cattle kings, who count 
their acres by the hundreds of thousands. This order 
of things is being broken up, as many of these cattle 
barons find it rather expensive to pay taxes on vast 
holdings. This is as it should be. It will be far 
better for the people and, consequently, for the State, 
if the business of stock-raising was carried on by a 
greater number of persons and the ranches were of 
fairly limited size. It has been my privilege to visit 
a number of the cattle districts of the State. Several 
years ago I was on a camping trip through that 
wonderful and almost inaccessible .country toward 
the northwestern corner of the State—the great 
timber and agricultural county of Humboldt. This 
county is mountainous—it is almost impossible to find 
a level acre of land within its confines, except in a 
few locations, and the soil in these locations is of 
wonderful fertility. Owing to this section of Cali¬ 
fornia receiving greater rainfall than any other por¬ 
tion of the State is favored with, there is a better 
stand of grass than is to be found almost else¬ 
where. I never saw such growth of vegetables, 
grain and fruit as is to be found, especially along 
the Eel River bottoms. Most of this land was 
originally covered with redwood timber. The giant 
stumps were gradually cleared off and the land 
put under cultivation. For many years it was the 
great potato-growing region of California. “Hum¬ 
boldt reds” were to be found in all the markets on 
the coast, and these potatoes had a flavor and 
1199 
superior quality all their own, but in time the land 
became exhausted for this line of crops. The farm¬ 
ers worked the soil for all it was worth. One crop 
of potatoes followed another; there was no rota- 
tin, so the soil became poverty-stricken for the 
white man’s edible tuber. As the land became poorer 
the farmer turned his attention to dairying. The 
land was used to grow crops of fodder for stock; 
corn, beets and peas took the place of spuds. The 
cattle were ranged on the adjacent hills. And so, 
before long, this country became the great dairying 
section of California. Alfalfa is now frequently grown. 
It is now some years since I was among the 
creameries of the Eel River country. In the picture, 
Fig. 513, on first page, I present an early view of a 
creamery in a clearing in the redwoods on the 
Yager River, a branch of the Eel. Except for some 
milk that comes from the table lands about Hydes- 
ville, nearly all the product that goes to this cream¬ 
ery came from small herds kept in and through the 
mountain fastness up the Yager. A person has no 
conception of the solitude of some of these mountain 
ranches until he has visited the country. And all 
through the canyons—and there is an everlasting 
number of them—one may find little spots and nooks 
where the venturesome have established a home, and 
there cows and children thrive almost to the ex¬ 
clusion of everything else. And thus 
is the wealth of California augmented. 
Foreigners are becoming the great 
dairying people of the Golden State. In 
some districts the Swiss predominate, 
and there you will find excellent Swiss 
cheese, as good as, and perhaps better 
than, comes from the Alps and there¬ 
abouts. In other places you will find 
Danes and Swedes; Portuguese in 
others, and Italians in rare instances. 
I presume the reason so many of these 
people are found in the business in this 
State is because conditions here, espe¬ 
cially for those people who come from 
the mountainous districts of Europe, 
are about the same as they were iii 
their native countries. There are many 
Americans and Irishmen engaged in 
the dairy business, but they are mostly 
to be found about the bay region or 
in level sections ot the State, presum¬ 
ably because thev nearly always man¬ 
age some other line of farming in con¬ 
nection with thei-r milk and butter in¬ 
terests. 
Generally butter brings a good price, 
especially during the past few years. 
At the beginning of this December fine 
table butter is quoted at 45 cents per 
pound. I don’t tiiink it was below 30 
cents at any time during the year. 
Eggs and butter have traveled well to¬ 
gether in the market quotations. The 
former are listed at 60 and more cents 
per dozen, according to “quality.” This 
Winter dairymen will make more than 
they did last Winter, owing to the 
lower price of feed this year—hay is 
25 per cent and more cheaper. 
Humboldt apples are second to none, 
but that will be another story. The 
gradual development of California’s hor-. 
ticultural and agricultural wealth into special lines 
forms a volume in itself. w. A. pryal 
Mr. Geo. Robert White has provided the money 
needed to issue each year a beautiful gold medal for 
excellence in horticultural work. The Massachusetts 
Horticultural Society will have charge of the matter 
and the medal will be awarded annually “To the man 
or woman, commercial firm or institution in the 
United States that has done the most during the year, 
or in recent years, to advance the interest in horti¬ 
culture in its broadest sense.” The first award has 
just been made to Prof. C. S. Sargent. This is a 
very worthy and desirable thing. It is the fate of 
many who do great and lasting things for the world 
to be denied the material benefits which they deserve. 
Let them at least have the sentiment and honor 
which their achievements have won, and let agricul¬ 
ture and horticulture stand on an equal footing with 
other professions. 
Every now and then we have letters describing diseases 
of children, with requests for “experience.” People seem 
to lie willing to try any experiment or “cure” on the 
child Why do they not see a good doctor and follow 
his directions to the letter? 
The health officials in the Hawaiian Islands are elimi¬ 
nating the mosquitoes with calcium carbide, which, when 
put into water infested with "wigglers,” is more deadly 
to them than kerosene. This is a new and valuable U3e 
for refuse from acetylene gas plants. 
NATURAL SIZE FRUIT OF COMMON JUJUBE. Fig. 516. 
See Ruralisms, Page 1205. 
