Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1905-09-23
SUPPORT HOTTIE CREAMERIEs.
Before Trust Like the Beef Trust
Gets Control.

: A trust that could dictate the
price to be paid for cream and butter,
and at the same time make it's own
price to the consumer of butter
would have opportunity to rob the
people as bad or worse than the
beef trust does today, and yet that
is just what will happen if farmers
continne to ignore their, own local
creamery and build UP the big city
concerns. The Wheaton Gazette
Reporter discusses this question in
very able manner in recent issue.
Editor Joubert says:
Large creamery plants in the
cities are reaching out into the
country for cream and in some in
stances are menscing the existence
of the local creameries. 1t is but
the comWencement, in this industry,
of the centralizing movement that
has placed the control and the
power Of fixing the value of 80 many
other products, in the hands Of few.
The rapid development Of the dairy
industry in this state has opened the
way for vast profits for few if the
manufacture Of butter can be mono
polized by confning the industry to
few large factories located at con-
venient points. Almost every other
product of the farm passes from the
hands of the producer to combina-
tons that confscate the greater
share of the profits, and the cream
cry industry now offers new
opportunity that the shrewd money
graspers hope to wax fat upon, and
they will succeed if the farmers Of
the state do not awak' n to
the danger and stand Loyalty by
the little home creamery that has
made the state famous the world over
for it's butter and made handsome
profits that, up to the present time,
have all gone to the producers,
At the present time the large plants
are paying good prices for cream,
sometimes even higher than the
local creameries can pay, They are
obliged to do this because they now
have to compete with the local butter
factories, but how long do you sup
pose this will continue if a few
capitalists once get cnntro] of the
situation? Like the beef trust they
will pay the farmer just enough to
keep him pegging along and will
appropriate the profits to their own
use. They will have the farmer
even more firmly under their thumb
in controlling his milk products
than they now have in fixing the
grades and prices of bis grain,
because, if dissatisfied, farmer can
ship his own grain and sometimes
gain by it, but cream and milk are
products that must be got to market
and disposed of quickly and furn-
ishes no opening for private buyers.
A creamery trust would have SUI
preme control and there would be
no way of breaking it's grasp except
by starting up the local factories
again, and then, by employing
Standard Oil methods and bidding
few cents over what a local plant
could pay, they would soon drive it
out of business and then reduce the
price to the old level. The farmers
now have control of the situation
and if they are wise they will retain
it. If the local plants are forced out
of business by the larger factories, a
creamery trust is inevitable, and we
all know what that means to the
farmer. If they would but give this
subject careful consideration there
are few farmers who would pass by.
their home creamery to ship their
cream to the city factories.