The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1881-10-06
HOPS.
Hop Fields OF Central New York-How
Hops nre Gathered.


Hops are Gathered.
The first crop of hops raised in
America was grown by James d. Cool
edge in the town of Madison, New
York, in 1908, who collected for his
hopfield what roots could be spared
from single hills in his neighbors' gar
dens. With these homegrown hops he
supplied local breweries and in 1916
Mr.. Coolidge had progressed 30 far
and so proftably that he took a crop to
New York city for sale. His neighbor.
Solomon Root, in 1917 followed him in
the enterprise, and Id his first crop
of two tons for $1,000 per ton. Then
every farmer thereabouts that could get
a fow roots was ambitious to have a
hopfeld; and from this beginning the
surrounding sections in Madison,
Oneida and Otsego counties have de-
veloped the industry, till this section
of New York has come to be known as
the "Kent of America" because of its
fourishing hop gardens. Though hops
are now raised in somewhat fitful
manner in other counties of the State.
and in all but three of the States and
Territories of the Union, yet the New
York counties mentioned have in recent
years raised more than all the rest of
the United States; and New York may
fairly be called the hop growing State;
for in 1870, when the entire crop of the
country was 25,456, 669 pounds, she
raised 1853, ,0S1 pounds within her
own limits.
Hops are used in domestic bread
making, by druggists, and by bakers
and distillers for yeast; but their chief
market is among brewers of beer. The
brewers use from one and quarter to
three pounds of hops to barrel of
beer, according as light" or "heavy"
beer issought. English brewers chop"
their beer more heavily than American.
Every bale of hops will on the average
chop" hundred barrels of beer. The
official records of the internal revenue
department declare that in the year
previous to June l, 1880, 13,347, 10
barrels of beer were consumed in the
United States. This home consump-
tion of beverage requiring annually
over 1873, 900 bales of hops in it's manu-
facture, coupled with the usual demands
of the English market, shows that
American hop-culture may now be fairly
rated among the established industries
of the country.
In late years the hop harvest in Cen
tral New York begins about the Goth
of August, and the problem of harvest
ing is one of the most serious that con-
fronts the extensive hep-grower. Every
available man, woman and child that
can pull a cluster of hops from vine is
summoned from the cities and villages
surrounding the hop districts; hence
for many of the working classes in the
inland cities of New York the annual
hop harvest becomes their vacation
time, the Saratoga of their recreations,
for the aroma rising from the hop is
health giving tonic to the human sys-
TEN, that for the health-seeker will
compare favorably with the tonic waters
of our popular American spa. The
average price now paid in the section
about Waterville, New York, is fifty
cents per box of seven bushels, or thirty
five cents and board. The National
bank of Waterville in 1880 paid out
100000 to hop.pickers at the end of
the hop harvest. One man and wife who
picked eleven boxes per day stood at
the head in last years harvest. The
average is perhaps three boxes per day
for each picker, and the harvest lasts
nearly a month. One diligent old
woman of Brookfeld, New York, once
earned alone 800 in hop harvest, and
the name sold Hundred still clings
to her as memorial of the work of her
deft fingers.
Waterville-a village of some two
thousand Inhabitants, situated in the
extreme southern part of Oneida county
is from its position the hop center of
Central New York. Thither flock the
agents of the great breweties of the
country; here swarm, soon after hop
harvest, the hop exporters and commits
sion men of the metropolis; and here
live vast number of extensive hop
growers - farmers whose capital, ac-
luired in hop-culture, has raised them
to plane in the business where they
can both control large farms and act as
commission dealers in the commodity.
The rush for meals is always notable
feature of a day IN the hop fields, for
hop-hunger is proverbial. What the
ozone of the sea air is to the inhabitant
of the rural districts, or the bracing at
mosphere of the north woods is to the
dweller in the metropolis, the appetiz-
ing hop fields are to many dySpeptic
among the hop-pickers. On the large
farms breakfast is often served by can
delight, before the first peep of day.
The call to dinner comes at II o'clock,
and supper at five, and in some fields
the hungry humanity waits till after
dark fer the evening meal. Barrels of
drinking water are constantly kept in
the large fields for the convenience of
the pickers.
Not only the catering but the sloep,
ing arrangements for so many hop.
pickers are parts of the annual problem
of the hop harvest. In one farm Wis
tied forty-four beds We're crowded into
the women's room," and an equal
number in the sleeping room for the
men.
The hop sections Of Central New
York, as the harvest nears its close,
look like a limitess Indian encamp-
ment, as the twenty-foot hop-poles are
stacked after picking in a manner
closely resembling the frame of an
aboriginal wigwam, and it is singular
coincidence that these wigwam- studded
hopfelds are the very grounds which
the Oneidas of olden time frequented
as they raised their cone-shaped habi-
tations of those early days.