ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN’S ASSOCIATION. 41 
Topic No. 10 was again resumed, when G. P. Lord, Esq., 
of Elgin, read the following paper: 
G. P. LORD’S PAPER. 
Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Convention :_“ How 
shall we improve the dairy interest of Illinois ? ” 
The importance of this question will be felt if we consider the vast 
i amount of money invested in the dairy business. We have no statistics 
! showing the amount invested in the State of Illinois. 
It has been stated that there are 1,022 butter and cheese factories, 460 000 
cows, and 1,380,000 acres of land in the State of New York devoted to this 
interest. 
If the factories are estimated at $5,000 each, the cows at $40 per head, 
and the land at $50 per acre, then we have a total sum of $92,720 000 invested 
by the dairymen of New York. If to this we add the value of the horses 
i wagons, agricultural implements, etc., required for the prosecution of this 
| branch of industry, we shall find it will amount to at least $100,000 000 
which is invested in dairying in the State of New York. Adding to this 
the amount invested in the States of Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin, and we 
find a capital of nearly if not quite $200,000,000 used in the dairy business in 
these four States, a fair proportion of which is invested in the State of 
Illinois. 
How best to advance the interest of this branch of industry in this State 
is now under consideration. We shall be better prepared to devise means 
foi advancing the dairy interest if we take a view of the obstacles and dif¬ 
ficulties to be overcome. 
One of these is the labor and expense of marketing the milk. This has 
to be done in seed time and harvest, mid rain and shine. If we take the 
average distance traveled by the dairymen in taking milk to the factory at 
three miles, we find that in the three hundred working days in a year he has 
traveled 1,800 miles, which is equal to sixty days’ travel of thirty miles per 
day. Valuing this time at three dollars per day—the lowest price paid for 
man and team—and we find it has cost him in labor one hundred and eighty 
dollars per year to market his milk. To this must be added the cost of 
manufacturing and selling the product of the milk. The present charge for 
manufacturing and selling cheese is understood to be 21 cents per pound. 
If we take the average product of the dairymen at six cans of milk per day, 
and allowing that each gallon of milk produces one pound of cheese we 
shall find that it has cost $438 to manufacture and sell the cheese. Now 
taking these two items, the average annual expense in labor and money 
to each dairyman is $618. This with the interest at ten per cent, would in 
ten years amount to $9,000. Now if a dairy business be prosecuted on one 
farm by father and son for the space of forty years, the savings of these 
two items, with the interest at ten per cent., if treated as bankers treat their 
capital, would amount to over $200,000, which of itself would be a very 
