THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
291 
If it was practical under a twentieth century postal 
law to offer for mail at a pound rate without stamps af¬ 
fixed, items of printed matter without regard to their 
individual rate, save as to a high limit, there would 
ensue advantages both to the citizen and to the nation. 
Freed from the necessity of keeping his catalogs with¬ 
in the two-ounce jump to avoid penalization, the business 
man could work out his offering to his customers with¬ 
out handicap. He would be paying, at a pound rate, ac¬ 
curately for the service the postoffice renders him, as the 
newspaper publisher now pays. His costs would be 
reduced, for he could use the paper most suitable for 
his work, and he would be released from the expense of 
affixing postage stamps, as the publishers of periodicals 
have long been released. 
The advantage to the postoffice organization would ever 
be greater. Many millions less of stamps would need to be 
printed, counted, stored and charged, old and accounted 
for. At least half the heavy and delaying work of stamp 
cancellation would be avoided, releasing men, machines 
and room, for meeting the increase in business without 
increase in cost. All the weighing to ascertain the ac¬ 
curacy of prepayment, all the ‘'postage due” expense 
and accounting would be ended, for matter of the third 
class offered in lots of a pound or more. 
The establishment of the pound rate for periodicals 
was an enormous postal advance. The institution of the 
parcel post was another enormous advance. To give 
business men a chance to pay equitably not more than 
four or five times as much for mailing advertising in 
catalogs and circulars as the periodicals pay for much 
the same advertising, would appear to be only decent to 
these business men. To save the Post Office department 
the cost of making, handling and cancelling the stamps 
uselessly affixed to the third class matter, ought to be 
worth while. The necessity for this reform, for it is a 
reform, is so obvious that it should be easy to bring 
about, especially under a postal administration as def¬ 
initely devoted to progress as the present one. No one is 
likely to be bothered by the change; no express com¬ 
pany would oppose this advance. 
Let us have a pound rate for third-class matter. 
THE WHINING REFRAIN 
Flushing, New York 
Nov. 14, 1921. 
Editor National Nurseryman, 
Hatboro, Penna. 
Dear Sir: 
I observe that in nearly all papers read, or addresses 
made before meetings of nurserymen, there is a nearly 
universal plaint about the hardship of the nurseryman‘s 
lot and his lack of remuneration for the service he rend¬ 
ers the world. Nearly all maintain that the same effort 
in other lines of enterprise would secure a better reward. 
In short, a whining refrain concerning the hardship and 
non-appreciation of their business. 
The first thought which occurs to me is why these 
men, who believe the world has so many better oppor¬ 
tunities do not embrace them, and in doing so achieve 
that success which is the reward of the capable and de¬ 
serving. 
Another explanation is that they are a portion of the 
lame ducks of the world,, who will not, because they can 
not, achieve any material success in any thing. Or are 
they obsessed with the opinion that has no valid founda¬ 
tion and is merely a condition of the mind rather than 
a reality. I am inclined to think the last explanation is 
the true one and I appeal to these croakers to disabuse 
themselves of this fallacious and demeaning complaint. 
It is no credit to anybody and helps no one. 
Adam Smith, the great economist of the 18th century, 
declared and by logical argument demonstrated that in 
a given time the reward of effort in any direction aver¬ 
aged the same in all occupations. 
It is certainly true that it is impossible in the nursery 
business, as in most other occupations, to amass millions, 
and it is neither desirable or best that we are able to 
do so. 
‘'Ill fares the land to hastening ills a prey where 
wealth accumulates and men decay.” 
Yours truly, Theo. Foulk. 
COLLEGE COURSE FOR NURSERYMEN 
The Massachusetts Agricultural College with the co¬ 
operation of the New England Nurserymen’s Associa¬ 
tion and the Massachusetts Nurserymen’s Association 
have arranged to give a course for men engaged in nur¬ 
sery work at the Massachusetts Agricultural College be¬ 
ginning January 2 and running through a period of ten 
weeks, closing March 10, 1922. This course has been 
provided at the request of the New England Nursery¬ 
men’s Association and is under the immediate direction 
of the standng Committee on Education of that society. 
The plan has the further support and cooperation of the 
Massachusetts Nurserymen’s Association. 
MARKET DEVELOPMENT WORK PROGRESSING 
Newspaper List Coming in Better, But There Are Still a 
Lot of Nurserymen Who Haven't Sent in Any. 
Last month, in this column, we did our best to empha¬ 
size the importance of getting in from every member of 
the National Association, a list of names of the news¬ 
papers in which he would like to have the Market Devel¬ 
opment articles appear. 
Since then, we have had a good many lists come in. 
but there are still a very large percentage of members of 
the Association, including many of the big fellows, too, 
who have never sent in so much as the name of a single 
newspaper. 
Inasmuch as it costs any firm nothing but a two-cent 
stamp to send in a list, it is difficult to understand why 
there should be any hesitation, even in the case of those 
who are skeptical about the efficiency of indirect adver¬ 
tising of this sort. Certainly it is not taking a very big 
gamble to invest the sum of two cents in an advertising 
campaign! 
There were numerous instances last year and the year 
before where members of the Association traced sales 
directly to these newspaper articlces. In some instances, 
these sales amounted to several hundred dollars. 
And, of course, for every dollar’s worth of business 
that can be traced from a source of this kind, there are 
thousands of dollars worth which cannot be traced. 
