Los Angeles herald., 1891-03-11
THE BEST YET.
The Citrus Fair all Unquali-
fled Success.
A Splendid Combination of Ex-
hibits and Decorations.
The Spectators Full of Enthusiastic
Admiration.
The Features Of the Opening Night-The
Oration-How the Hall Appears-A
Magnificent Spectacle.

A glorious food OF white light, an i'm
mense panorama OF brilliant color.
concourse of thousands of weli-dresset
people, strains of music floating over all
the flashing OF 'hundreds of vari-colore,
incandescent lamps. the hues and seen
OF flowers, and general sentiment O
enthusiastic admiration in the hearts
all who witnessed it--such was tn,
opening of the great citrus fair a
Hazards pavilion last evening.
Contrary to the custom which usual,
prevails on such occasions, the pro
gramme arranged for last night wa.
almost purely a musical one. Shortl,
after 8 O'Clock, a number of prominent
citizens took up positions on the stage
and President G. M. Wells of the cham
ber of commerce, in few brief but wei
turned phrases, formally declared The
fair open. and introduced Mr.. w, A
Spaulding, who delivered the address O
welcome.
His address was an exhaustive anC
well constructed statement of the past
and present OF orange culture. The fol
lowing extracts will indicate it's points
Mr.. Chairman Ladies and Gentlemen:
This is festal day for the citrus in.
dustry OF Southern California. Under
the patronage of the state our horticul-
turists have brought an offering of the
first fruits of the land, and the large. .au-
dience which see before me, made up
from all the diversified walks of life. has
assembled to honor the occasion.
This is more than an exhibition. 1t
IS designed, OF course, to display the
best fruits that our country can produce.
and thus to favorably impress the casual
beholdei; but beyond that, it is school
Tor the instruction of the grower, an en-
couragement to those struggling under
dlfhculties, an incentive to new effort
"a grand jubilee to mark successful
year in successful industry.
The orange, more than any other pro-
duct OF our soil. is accepted as typical of
Southern California. To the people of
other portions of the United States who
are not privileged to enjoy our almost
perpetual sunshine, we send this fruit
at time when the ice in their rivers
and lakes is breaking up, and in these
golden globes they can see the bright
ness and taste the sweetness of our eli
mate. Nature with a cunning hand has
stored up for us the intangible sunshine.
we say to the people OF the east, share
these bounties with us. Sometimes the
idea OF selling climate is ridiculed; but
the TACT Is, we are boxing up and selling
1T every year. In spirit Of generosity
we charge the people of the east only SIS
or ~ box for this sunshine. Eightys
and ninety-sixes are cheaper. -
when first took up my residence in
Los Angeles seventeen years ago, l
found the status of the citrus industry
vastly different from what it is today.
At that time not budded orange or
lemon was grown in the country, and
remember very well what contest there
was between the experts, as to whether
the budded varieties would do to culti-
vate.
Then it was that the first boom in
orange planting began. Many of its re-
suits still remain with us-some have
been swept away. Changes bad as we'll
as good were in store for us, and, in
TACT, the citrus industry was then on the
threshold OF revolution. 1t is said
that revolutions do not go backward, but
this one seemed to do so for time. The
black scale had already been busy
worker among the orchards of Los An
geles, and his attendant fungus, the
black smut, disfgured most of the
oranges produced here. Then a little
innocent looking red speck was brought
here on plant by an importing florist,
and that turned out to be the red scale,
which Joined its black bother in the
work OF devastating the orchards. BY
and-by new scale came in to re-enforce
the black and the red. He was the
white or cottony-cushion scale, and he
was found to be the worst of a very bad
lot.
You know the rest of the story,
Nearly all Of the orchards about this
city which did not succumb to the scale
bugs, fell shortly afterward before the
still more deadly real estate boomers,
and some of their lot-stakes stand to the
present day as monuments to the dead
trees.
Of course the orange-growers were not
men to idly face such calamity. They
took up the study of entomology in a
practical way, and some of them have
now graduated and ought to be called
professors. They devised sprays and
washes. and they scrubbed their trees
with brushes, and baptized them with
all sorts OF noxious decoctions. The
earlier experiments were not brilliant
successes. Sometimes they killed the
bugs and sometimes they killed the
trees. Sometimes they killed both.
Sometimes, ! apprehend, the sprayer
himself only escaped by the skin of his
teeth. But, in any event, the bugs came
back again, if there was the vestige Of a
tree to come back to. All this time,
however, the amateur entomologists
were learning their lesson thoroughly,
and at last occurred the brilliant idea OF
fighting satan with fire.
When bug met bug, then came the tug of
war.
In the summer of 1858, Prof. @. ".
Riley of the department of entomology,
at Washington, was enabled to send to
Australia, a scientist of our own state
with an especial mission to look up the
natural enemies of our insect pests.
The man who accomplished this mission
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