Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1903-08-01
BANANAS ARE IN SEASON .
Increase in ConSunpt or of the
Fruit in United Statss.
DUTY OF A MESSENGER.
Spring and Summer the Best Time for
the Trade, 200, oco Bunches
Imported Last Year.

One would think that as warm weather
approaches and fresh fruits and vegeta-
bles begin to cheaper, the banana man $
profits would begin to fall off. But this
IS just the time of year when they swell
to three times their winter proportions.
1t is not in winter, when little other
fruit is to be had, that people consume
bananas in vast quantities, but in sum
mer. when they assault the eyes OF the
millions temptingly without danger Of
freezing.
america has within the last ten years
become the greatest banana consuming
country on the globe. Twenty-four mil
hon lunches were imported last year into
the United States. an Increase of 40 per
cent over ten years ago. This increase is
due simply and solely to ventilators. The
ordinary ship has no ventilators i'll the
holds. The ship constructed specially for
carrying bananas has from twelve 10
twenty big ones. The company which
controls so per cent. of the banana trade
has Seventy-tive Of these banana ships II
active service.
On the Railroad.
But care can by no means relax after
the banana lands on American soil For
long distance hauls the national fruit OF
the tropics requires almost as much at
u. L
particularly true IN the west. where the
messenger service is an important de-
partment of banana commerce. The
banana messenger holds an interesting
position. He takes the ears for the west
ern trade out of New Orleans, on some
trips having as many as twenty under
his charge. They must be dropped along
the way from st. Louis to the coast, and
they must reach each town in the right
condition, ripened just enough to make
good eating. This maturing takes place
on the cars. and depends on the messen-
gers Skillful manipulation of ventilators.
No artificial heat is supplied in winter.
The cars are heated with stoves before
departure, and the stoves are then re-
moved. After that the vast mass of
moist bananas will generate even too
much heat if left to themselves
There is a thermometer in each car,
and 1t is the messengers business TO
Keep the temperature regulated to dot,
SO that the man in Kansas City and the
man i'll Seattle will get his bananas just
right. So that, in fact westerners CON
sumo bananas ripened by messenger serv-
ice instead of the sun. Twenty-Five mes
sengers make their headquarters in New
Orleans. but in the east the distances
are so much less that not more than five
or six are kept busy.
Banana Countries.
Bananas for New York come from ia
maica, Costa Rica, Cuba. Santo Domingo
and Santa Marta in South America
Those for New Orleans come mostly
from the United States of Colombia and
various parts of Central America. The
fruit company which so largely controls
the trade raises 60 per cent. of the
product it handles on its own plantations,
where it cultivates the fruit. although it
Will grow without cultivation through
out tropical America. There are only
two kinds of bananas. the red and the
yellow, but the red one is no longer
handled, owing to it's poor Transporting
among the humber housewives of trop-
ical America. Two varieties of the
plantain, which is kind of banana, are
imported for the southern trade.
The same improved methods of trans
portation which have made Americans a
race vi banana eaters, have begun the
same transforming process with the Eng
lish. But refrigerator ships are neces-
sary. summer and winter, to enable the
banana to stand the seventeen or
eighteen day voyage TO Liverpool. as
against that of FIVE days to New York.
The first refrigerator banana ships from
Jamaica to Liverpool were put on in
1901. with a fOrtnightly service. This
was increased to weekly service last
year, each ship carrying 10000 stems
Probably 100000 stems were landed in
Liverpool last year. an increase of 100
per cent. over the year before. The peo-
pie of England and Europe generally do
not know what a good banana is. They
have been used to eating them when the
skin is green, at which time they are
not fit for food. Under the fostering
care of the banana section of the Ameri-
can invasion they will probably become
as great banana eaters as Americans; all
of which means an economic change of
considerable Importance to tropical
America.-New York Commercial Ad-
yertiser