Part 38 (2/2)

So Mr Strickland, in conjunction with his regular work, kept an eagle eye on a few orchards and would notify the owners when it see had conificent yields of A-1 fruit; others in the sa calendars, didn't do nearly so well

All this set Manager Peet to thinking ”Strickland hasn't got an automobile and has lots of other work to do,” he reasoned; ”but why, if he had a car and could give all the time necessary to such work, couldn't the same results be had in orchards all over the county? Why can't this far service?”

He put the idea up to the executive coreed, but it would cost at least 500 to try it out the first year The bureau didn't have the available funds

”Tell you what,” they finally said: ”If you want to get out and rustle up 500 new , we'll authorize it”

Peet was tellingfor four years with a paid-up membershi+p of about 375,” he said, ”and if I believed in hth when the coave me this decision Well, I did it in tiot the new ements werein soil and topographic conditions Criterion orchards were selected in each zone The inspector, with the aid of daily telegraphic weather reports and through constant inspection of the criterion orchards, decided when the hour struck for theof these orchards

In the er Peet and the inspector had worked out a code syste instructions and put this into the hands of the growers in the six zones When it came time to spray, the telephones from headquarters in Lockport were put to work and the code e sent to certain orchardists; these in turn repeated the instructions to a nureed upon, until every e

The scheme has worked The first year there were 800 members who took this service; the second year--1918--there were 900; this year there are 1500 It is paying for itself rowerservice and that none of these had more than five per cent of their fruit to cull out The ninth h the service He culled forty-five per cent of his crop There are scores of siet the support of the Niagara farmers for any er Peet next began to agitate for an iust, 1915, the syste farm produce for Lockport's consumption consisted of sporadic visits by producers to the city with produce to be sold at prices largely controlled by the local groceryulated by the saht drive into Lockport with 100 quarts of strawberries He would stop at a grocery and offer therocer would say, ”I don't want any Say, how much do you want for theive you six”

Whereupon the rocer But the ht to his phone, call up the rest of the trade and inform it that there were 100 quarts of strawberries on the streets for which he had offered six cents against ten asked The result would be that the farer Peet joined hands with the Lockport Board of Co this condition He proposed a city market for farmers The nearest approach to a market was a shelter for teams which the local food dealers had rented

To 700 farer Peet wrote letters, calling their attention to these conditions and offering the city- Lockport's population of consu theether , decided on a location for a market in Lockport, decided on ot the city's co the huckstering of fartheoff a street section which should be used as athe superintendent of streets in charge

That was all Not a cent of appropriation asked for The ons in place Before the summer was over it was coarden supervisor acted as inspector He looked over the produce, advised the fary in the direction of popularizing theproducers and consuer Peet and the inspector a scheain day in ree to pack and offer for sale on those days a limited nuht be corn In the case of toain price would be ten cents for baskets which that day were selling regularly for eighteen to twenty-five cents To each of these baskets--no farreen tag noting that it was a bargain

Each bargain day was advertised in advance as would see an early rush to the ains would be cleaned out and then business at normal prices would continue at a brisker rate than usual

The first year of its operation thisthis period 1300 rigs sold out their produce for a total of 13,000 This si prices in Lockport and has encouraged the bringing in of farulate theet too low in Lockport, the supply in sight is ih action by the producers in shi+pping the stuff to Niagara Falls or Buffalo by motor trucks

The distribution of Lockport's milk supply, as happens in hundreds of cities, has been attended by considerable waste and expense as a result of duplication of delivery routes, breakage of bottles and uneconoer Peet was holding athe city for the purpose of settling this inequity once and for all A little agitation had been carried on ahead of this , but only a little Peet had a plan

”It's all wrong to plan for asyste; ”these are too likely to get ht we just about clinched our arrange system owned by the producers theht distributors with fifteen wagons handling theloss in time and money as a result of this coether on the plan of securing options on these distributors' interests, and last night we just about wound up all the preliminaries We already have our li under the Meanization comes under the a closely the California law under which the California fruit growers' associations operate

”We figure that ill need between 20,000 and 30,000 for the purchase of buildings, wagons, equipood-will now in the hands of the distributors At first we thought it would be a good plan to have every member of the association subscribe to the amount proportioned by the number of cows he keeps or the amount of milk he has for sale But for several reasons this wouldn't work So we hit on the sche each man subscribe to the amount he personally is able to finance

”We already have 24,000 subscribed in su five-year certificates of indebtedness bearing six per cent interest Our producers will have about 9000 worth of milk a month to distribute We plan to deduct five per cent every month from these milk checks to pay off the certificates Then later we'll create a new set of certificates and redistribute these in proportion to the aer Peet and the producers areit perfectly plain to Lockport consu price control In fact, they expect to sell milk for a cent a quart under the old price

The fare which antedated our entrance into the war becaan to operate

New York farmers were as hard hit as any other farmers, particularly in the fruit sections, where a treara County caara County Farency