The Republican journal., 1905-05-04
A MILLION IN BERRIES.
MARKET GARDENING RESOURCES IN
NORTH CAROLINA.

MARKET GARDENING RESOURCES IN
NORTH CAROLINA.
WILMINGTON, n. e., April %. A mar
row strip of the Tar Heel State neal
this city enjoys monopoly in the straw
berry industry for two weeks every
spring. While that does not seem long
it means when expressed in cash some
thing over million dollars, all extract
ed from resources that were little IN
derstood few years ago.
Farmer Chadwick, whose only expert.
ence was that of local barkeeper three
years ago, is said to be making over
$4,000 a year from his truck garden,
most of it on strawberries. A New
York commission house offered him in
advance $4,000 for all his crop this
year, but he refused it. Farmer Trask
bought farm of sixty acres and paid
for it in full, $1,000 from profits real
lied the first year. Farmer Struthers
gave up political job in the local Gus
tom house paying 81, 200 year to work
neglected farm, and at the end of the
year he had saved $1,000 above his liv-
ing expenses.
In the old days the farmers blindly
sent all their berries to one market,
New York or Philadelphia. Down went
the price. mo demand" wired the
commission house to its representative
on the spot and then he could get all
the berries in North Carolina for a
song. At the New York end the COM
mission merchant found good demand
from other cities. He was allowed to
grow prosperous as middlenan at the
expense of the growers and the cities
which had not learned to deal direct
The old system, too, meant inferior
berries tor the other cities buying
through the middlemen, as with every
reshipment the quality of the goods de-
terlorated. Now the growers study the
fundamental law of supply and demand
and instead of breaking their bank ac-
counts by buttlng against 1t they fall in
line and senslbly send strawberries to
the cities that have none. Shipping di-
, rect they lave control and are able to
maintain top prices. For example, a
town like keene, y. H., will take nine
carloads OF berries that will be fresh
and juicy upon arrival in refrigerator
cars that fly northward over the Allan
tic Coast Line Railroad with right of
way that takes precedence over pas
Senger trains The keene market was
developed when prices were low at the
big cities, and SO with other smaller
markets.
Strangely enough, Brooklyn ranks
lower than keene DIS a strawberry mar
ket. Out OF AIS carloads sent to New
York city last year from this section
only three went direct to Brooklyn to
It is stated here that trucking mo-
nopoly controls the situation in New
York and insists ON taking a Carriage
profit for transferring the goods from
Pier 20 to BreoElsti. The i ioits Journey
across the pavements of Manhattan
alh! the bridge jounces the berries I'M
necessarily and makes the time between
leaving the refrigerator cars and the
consumers table several hours longer
than need be. When the pains taken to
secure speedy delivery from the South
are considered it seems absurd that SO
much time should be wasted in handling
the berries at the New York end. De-
livery in refrigerator cars could ne
made as quickly to. the Pennsylvania
Wallabout pier as at Pier 30, This mo-
nopoly Or shortsightedness places
Book.yn behind such small towns as
keene, n. Il, and Cortland, n. Y.
Why Is Wilmington, n. c., the center
of che early strawberry industry
Florida's output Of 800 cars comes first,
but it is insignificant. Her berries
travel day lengegeto reach New York
and they average e ROM 60 tqs 7s'cents a
box. Hot poAof don't hegiH to take
their spring medicine in this form till
North Carolina comes along with bet
ter berries for far less money, shading
! her prices off from 25 to 10 cents box
gradually as Long t.1sland and New
Jersey crowd her out of the market.
But for two Whole weeks North Caro-
lima is the only place in the world where
New York can get her berries in car
load lots. And as the berry appetite is
whetted by berries, the North could
probably take hundred times the
present output of North Carolina, only
about ten million boxes. Then if you
+. will examine government map show
ing. the mean annual rainfall in the
United States you will learn another
reason. Enough rain falls in a mar
row strip. fifty miles wide, skirting
the North Carolina coast, to drown
the average man standing erect,
could the precipitation for year be
caught OH the level and held without
loss. ADOuI seventy luClcS are Wldt
the records show. There is only one
little spot in Florida that can equal it,
and that includes Pensacola and the
region to the eastward. But the
Florida section lacks the peculiar sandy
loan with clay sub-soil and the humid
atmospheric conditions and an insur-
mountable barrier to the successful cul-
tivation there of the strawberry is the
greater distance from the large markets,
day farther away. So the section OF
North Carolina, New Hanover County,
near the coast, has been well called "a
bit of Florida" and nature has here en-.
dowed million or more acres with
soil and climate suited to perfection to
the raising of every kind of garden
sass" wonderfully toothsome and in
marvellous abundance. Less than ten
thousand of those acres, titled by about
a thousand owners, are now yielding ar
income of 81, 5OO,0OO. These farms have
been nearly all developed during the
past five years. The savings banks Of
Wilmington in 1898 had $50, 900 on de
posit. To-day the savings banks hole
over $4,000, 900, principally the savings
of the truckmen.