American Agriculturist, November 1, 1924 
313 
The Trouble Maker 
By E. R. Eastman 
The Story Thus Far 
Jim Taylor, a young dairyman of the 
East, broods over the hard lot of the farmer. 
He and his neighbor, Johnny Ball, have] a 
rather heated argument over the situation and 
discuss the treatment of the dairymen at the 
hands of the milk dealers. The following day 
Jim’s milk is refused by Shepherd, the super¬ 
intendent of the milk receiving station at 
Speedtown. An argument ensues and Jim 
strikes Shepherd, knocking him into a milk 
vat. Dairymen realize a fight is coming. 
They soon assemble to listen to a representa¬ 
tive of a newly organized farmer association 
known as the Dairymen’s League. 
“ T)OYS,” he said, “I didn’t come over 
-D here to make a speech. I couldn’t if 
I wanted to, anyway. But I do want to 
take a few minutes to tell you why I asked 
you to come to this" meeting right in the 
'middle of haying. If you will excuse my 
being personal, I would like to tell you 
that I was born and raised on a large 
dairy farm. I mention this because it has 
a bearing on what I have to say. 
“When I was a kid I went without all 
of the luxuries and many of the necessi¬ 
ties of life because my father was a dairy¬ 
man, and dairying didn’t pay. Every 
time I see children eating oranges now as 
commonly as they eat apples, I think of 
the few times in my young life when 
Mother brought home just one orange, 
and even though she divided that orange 
among five children, it was a great treat. 
Bitter poverty was my portion as a child, 
and it was the lot of every farm family 
that I knew; and while conditions have 
improved somewhat, the great majority 
of farm people make only a bare living.” 
A LL over the dimly lighted room men 
- were nodding their heads in em¬ 
phatic agreement. 
“These things,” Bradley went on, “so 
impressed themselves upon me that I 
early had the desire to do something in 
my life that would help to bring about a 
better day in farming. Somehow I had 
gained the notion that to do this I must 
get some education, so I worked out at 
starvation wages for neighbor farmers, 
raised potatoes on shares and sold them 
from ten to fifty cents a bushel, and did 
every other thing that came to my hand 
to work my way through high school. 
And then I went to agricultural college 
and finally became a farm bureau man.” 
“A darned good one, too,” shouted one 
of the younger farmers. Then Bradley 
had to wait, embarrassed, until they 
had finished cheering him. 
“Two years ago,” he continued, “I 
came down to this county, happy and 
enthusiastic that at last I was in a posi¬ 
tion to do something worth while for 
farmers. I had great dreams of bringing 
a new prosperity to these farmers. I 
saw the fields that needed drainage, the 
buildings that needed repairing, the crops 
that needed improvement; I saw what 
could be done with lime to make the 
clover grow and with spraying and prun¬ 
ing to rejuvenate the orchards, so I began 
to ride your hills and valleys and to talk to 
you at meetings, in your barns and in your 
lots about the gospel of better farming. 
"But something was wrong. Friends I 
made, to be sure, but progress toward that 
New Day seemed to be mighty slow, and 
I blamed you at times for standing in your 
own light. I finally saw what was the 
matter. I realized that there were two 
parts to the farming business, production 
and marketing. These many years all of 
us have been emphasizing and working 
to make two blades of grass grow where 
one grew before, without even trying to 
sell the first blade at a profit. Farmers 
are pretty good producers. The Amer¬ 
ican farmers are the most efficient in the 
world. This does not mean that there is 
no room for improvement. We should 
use better seed; we should study varieties; 
we should spray our orchards; we should 
weed out the poor cattle; and all of us will 
keep our costs of production down. But 
none of these things touched the greatest 
of all of our problems, that of marketing. 
“It was father’s poor marketing ability 
that kept us all in poverty, working the 
long days for a bare living. It is our poor 
sales methods that are making our women 
old before their time, and driving our boys 
and girls to the cities. It is our lack of 
study of our selling problem that has put 
farm people into the control of middlemen 
and is losing us our much-vaunted in¬ 
dependence. 
“My father sold milk at forty cents a 
hundred pounds, or one cent a quart; the 
consumer paid seven or eight cents for 
the same milk. Some of that great differ¬ 
ence paid for honest transportation and 
distribution. But the dealers got most of 
it in profit.” 
“Right!” shouted a young farmer. 
“Them hogs always have their noses in the 
trough whether they get anything or not.” 
T HREE or four others began to shout, 
and Bradley waited for them to get quiet 
before continuing. He held up his hand. 
“But, gentlemen, let us be perfectly 
fair. I don’t blame the dealers. We 
would probably do the same thing in their 
place. You are the ones to blame and 
there never will be any difference until you 
get busy yourselves to make the change. 
“So I have been considering this prob¬ 
lem and wondering what might be done. 
Lately there has been considerable talk 
in this county about the organization 
called the Dairymen's League. I have 
looked it up and while no one can be sure 
that the League can settle our difficulties, 
I believe it has possibilities. They will be 
as great as we farmers make them, so I 
have asked Mr. Stevens, a League repre¬ 
sentative, to come over with me to-night 
and tell you about this Dairymen’s 
League., Mr. Chairman, may I suggest 
that you now call on Mr. Stevens?” 
Old John Ball, the chairman, then arose 
and said: 
“Of course, we all agree with the facts 
our comity agent has just given us, but 
we mustn’t forget that the milk dealers 
are very powerful and that they could 
make it hot for all of us if they wanted to 
be disagreeable. It’s all very well for us 
to talk about a poor market, but a poor 
market is better than none at all. I think 
we’d better be mighty careful about goin’ 
too far with this discussion and talkin’ 
about joining some fly-by-night organiza¬ 
tion that we don’t know nothin’ about. 
“I suggest that we adjourn and go 
home and pay attention to somethin’ 
that we know somethin’ about.” 
J IM TAYLOR unwound himself from 
a cramped position in a primary seat 
near the front and said: 
“Just a moment, Mr. Chairman. I 
just want to ask, are we American men 
living in a free country, or are we a lot of 
spineless old women so afraid of the 
tyranny of the milk dealers that we don’t 
even dare talk above a whisper about the 
rotten deal that is being handed us? That 
idea to adjourn without hearing this 
League man makes me plumb mad. 
“No, I’m goin’ to make a motion. I 
move that we proceed to listen to this 
League representative and that any 
farmer here who is afraid to stay be 
excused to go home.” 
The motion was seconded and carried, 
and Stevens was introduced. 
“Gentlemen,” he said, “I am sorry 
that I got off to such a poor start with 
you. But this incident illustrates the 
strangle-hold that the dealers have on the 
milk business. As the gentleman just 
said, things have come to a pretty pass 
when free-born American farmers hesitate 
to discuss their common problems in 
open meetings. 
“Mr. Bradley of the farm bureau has 
told you why I am here. He has given 
you some idea also of why the League is 
here. I believe that it is here to stay. 
Let me tell you why. 
“I need only to call to your mind the 
bitter experiences which you producers 
are having every day, and have had for 
years in the making of milk. Let me 
first mention briefly what goes into the 
production of milk. Nearly all of your 
work and the work of your women and 
children is spent in raising the crops to 
feed your cattle, and taking care of and 
milking them. The corn that you raise, 
the hay that you harvest, and the grain 
that you buy with the little cash that 
you get hold of, all goes the same way. 
You spend years in growing the cows and 
in feeding them to get milk which you 
put into the dealer’s cans, and deliver it 
to the dealer’s station on the railroads. 
Did I say dealer’s station? Excuse me, 
I meant your station. Although the 
dealer owns it in name, it really belongs 
to you, for it was your money that paid 
for it many times over. 
“For the privilege which he confers 
upon you in buying your milk, you must 
appear at his station twice a year, in 
March and September, and sign a con¬ 
tract agreeing to deliver your milk under 
such and such conditions for the next six 
months at starvation prices. 
“At these contract periods you go to 
these stations and you stand in line with 
your brother farmer, and when your turn 
comes, you put your ‘ John Hancock ’ down 
on the dotted line where the dealer tells 
you to sign, and you sign the contract.” 
“If we don’t sign, we don’t sell,” inter¬ 
rupted a voice in the audience. 
E XACTLY,” continued the speaker. 
“The farmers’ independence is the 
one thing that has kept our people on the 
farms; but I ask you in all seriousness, 
how much independence have you when 
you go to the milk station and sign a 
contract to sell your milk for prices about 
which you have nothing to say, and then 
go over to the feed dealer or the merchant 
and buy your groceries and farm supplies 
at prices that the other fellow sets? 
“Although these conditions have been 
in existence for years, farm people have 
been able to worry along because they 
raised their own food, were willing to go 
without the luxuries and some of the ne¬ 
cessities of life, and because of the cheap 
help of the women and children. But 
those times are past. Farms are being 
abandoned, buildings are without paint 
or repair; our young folks have gone, and 
are going, to the cities. Sheep have dis¬ 
appeared from the East, and unless condi¬ 
tions change, the cattle are going, too. 
“But there is a way out if we can only 
come to it—through organization. Back 
in 1907, a few farmers down in Orange 
County got together and formed a little 
dairy organization which they called the 
Dairymen’s League. Since 1907, a few 
of those farmers who realized, as we all do, 
the bitter hard times in the dairy indus¬ 
try, looked ahead and saw' that the way 
out was through their own efforts. In 
every generation there are a few men 
who have faith and vision; faith in the 
fundamental principle that right will 
triumph in time, and vision to see w'hat is 
needed to set forces working toward right. 
Men such as these are working for the 
Dairymen’s League. On every hand they 
have met discouragement. They have 
been told hundreds of times, even by 
farmers themselves, that farmers can 
never stick together. Time and again 
some men will say, 'The League is all 
right, a good idea, but it’s no use for me 
to join because if I did, there’s my 
neighbor Smith on this side and Brown on 
the other that will never join; and if they 
did, they’d never stick.’ ” 
A S Stevens was talking, Jim Taylor 
• sat partly facing the audience. The 
few smoking lamps dispelled some of the 
gloom near the front of the room and 
filled the place with that peculiar odor of 
burning kerosene. Jim watched the faces 
of his'neighbors grow more and more inter¬ 
ested and excited, and he lost some of the 
gloom which had been with him for months. 
He said to himself: “At last they are 
ready. If there is anything to stick to, 
they’ll do it!” 
Then he brought his attention back to 
the speaker again. 
“But these leaders,” Stevens was say¬ 
ing, “have kept everlastingly at it until 
now 13,000 men have signed the League 
contract to sell their milk collectively. 
So the other day up in Albany, the direc¬ 
tors of the Dairymen’s League—farmers 
and dairymen themselves—got together 
and voted that in September the farmers, 
through their organization, would set the 
price on their own milk instead of letting 
the dealers set it. If the dealers won’t 
pay the price, they won’t get the milk!” 
There was a noisy clapping of hands 
and stamping of feet. The chairman 
pounded for order. When it was quiet, 
Stevens concluded: 
“Gentlemen, that completes my story. 
I have some contracts here for you to look 
over and, if you wish, to sign. I expect 
to spend the next few days in Speedtown 
and the vicinity, giving every dairyman 
a chance to come in with his neighbor and 
stand for a fair deal in the milk business. 
Gentlemen, I thank you.” 
The speaker sat down and again there 
was vigorous hand-clapping, but Taylor 
saw it was not unanimous. 
Ball again pounded for order, and recog¬ 
nized a farmer on his feet in the rear of the 
room. 
“Mister Speaker,” said this man, “let 
me tell you somethin’. Some years ago, 
a feller came up in here and made the 
same kind of a speech that you’ve made 
about a dairymen’s organization called 
the Five States Association. He made 
such a good speech and we were so hard 
up that most of us older fellers signed up 
and paid so much a cow to join. The 
leaders of that so-called organization took 
our money, and probably some from the 
dealers, and that’s the last we ever heard 
from them. You can’t blame us for being 
a little slow in coughing up our pennies 
to give some of you fellers a job riding 
around the country.” 
“Shame!” shouted a voice. 
“Sit down!” said someone else. 
Stevens arose and held up a hand. 
“I might be angry at what the gentle¬ 
man has just said,” he said, “but I am 
only hurt, for I happen to be a farmer, too, 
and all the pay I get out of the few days 
I am leaving my farm to do this work is 
my expenses, I am hurt and disap¬ 
pointed because every time farmers try 
to do anything in a body they don’t go 
far before someone begins to holler about 
the leaders selling them out, and the 
dealers have come to know that the 
quickest way to break up an organization 
is to sow such propaganda. 
“Now let me tell you something about 
the Five States Association, for I happen 
to know some of the leaders. They are 
farmers like yourselves; they were not 
dishonest. They put in weeks of service, 
for which they never received a cent; 
they made an honest effort to get you 
more money for your milk; they made the 
mistake of staging their fight with the 
dealers in June, when the country was 
flooded with milk, instead of doing it in the 
fall when milk is scarce. But the chief rea¬ 
son why the Five States Association failed 
was not due to the leaders, but because 
the farmers themselves did not stick.” 
Jim Taylor got the floor. 
“I for one am ready to give the League 
a trial. Men, that’s the least we can do. 
Let Mr. Stevens get his contracts ready 
at the desk and let every man who wants 
to—and I hope that means everybody — 
come up and put his name on this farmer’s 
contract. Mr. Chairman, there has been 
talk enough. It’s time to act. I move 
that the meeting be adjourned.” 
The motion was carried and Jim 
marched forward and signed the Dairy¬ 
men’s League contract, the first one in 
that neighborhood, a contract which 
marked the beginning of a long-drawn- 
out fight of rankling bitterness and of 
change in Eastern agriculture, a change 
which only time could tell to be for better 
or for worse. 
{Continued next week) 
