The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1899-02-08
MONKEY COTTON PICKERS.
INTERESTING EXPERIMENT BE-
ING TRIED In MISSISSIPPI.
Big Planter Worked 800 of Them in
His Cotton Fields Last Fail.
Better PickerS than the
Average Negro.


MIR. Thomas G. Lane contributes
the following very interesting article
10 the Southern Cotton Planters Jour
nal:
Two years ago, at the Vicksburg
fair, in the fall of 1896, as Prof. S. M.
Tracey and Mr.. W. w, Mangum were
watching some trained monkeys per-
form their various tricks, Prof. Ira
cey said to Mr.. Mangum
GAS sure as you are alive, Mangum
those monkeys can be taught to pick
cotton better and more chAaply than
our negroes do, and perpetual fame
will be the part of the man who first
tries the experiment."
At first Mr.. Mangum was inclined to
laugh at the idea, but the more he
thought over the matter, and the more
he watched the monkeys at their vari-
Gus tricks, the more he became con
WINGED that there was something in it,
and the next day as he left the pro
lessor al the Carroll hotel he said:
"Well, professor, | have been think
ing about your suggestion of teaching
monkeys to pick cotton, and l am de-
termined to try the thing and see if 1t
will work. They have been taught to
do many more difficult things than
that, and | am almost sure they can be
taught to pick cotton. We can't rely
on the negroes much longer, and next
fall / am going to buy me dozen mon
keys and see what can be done"
The next fall, that is in September
Of 1897, Mr.. Mangum hunted up the
owner and trainer of ten trained mon
keys : New York city, and made ar
74ments both to buy the monkeys
and to get the services of their trainer,
who understood the business and as
sured Mr.. Mangum That it would be
the simplest thing imaginable to
teach monkeys to pick cotton.
These were placed on one of Mr..
Mangum's Mississippi plantations
about the middle of September of that
year, and the training began. The
monkeys belong TO the race known to
scientists as Sphagtais Nulgaris, and
the males weigh about 10 pounds and
the females about 80 pounds each.
Bags were made for each monkey.
which would hold about % pounds of
seed cotton, and bag placed over the
shoulder of each. 1t is surprising how
rapidly the trainer taught the mon,
keys to pick cotton. Baskets to hold
the cotton were placed at the end of
the rows, and one man, over and above
the trainer, was necessary to take the
cotton out of the sacks and to put it in
the baskets. The females proved
much better pIckers than the males,
for they not only picked cleaner cot.
ton, but they would also pick more of
1t in day. In less than a MONTH af-
ter the monkeys were started at the
work they coulu pick on an average of
$50 pounds a day. They picked in
weather in which negroes would not
pick, and picked cleaner cot
ton. The cost of picking was
much less, and in every way they
made much better pickers than the ay.,
erage negro.
The first experiment, although on a
small scale, proved to Mr.. Mangum
that monkeys could be used with great
success as cotton pickers, so in June of
1898 he made an order for 300 mon
keys OF the same breed on an exporter
of monkeys from Africa, with the un>
derstandIng that most of them were to
be females. About the first of Septem-