West Virginia argus. [volume] (Kingwood, W. Va.) 1877-1946, 1906-05-10
OUR washington LETTER
Cotton Growers Of The South Getting
Down 10 Business.
BUILDING WAREHOUSES; TO STORE
Away Their Cotton and Hold Il for
Fair Price-Thc United States
Grows fiye.sixths OF the Worlds
Cotton.
From Our Regular Correspondent.

Cotton.
From Our Regular Correspondent.
WASHINGTON May 8, 1000. -
For the first time in the history OF
the cotton business in the United
States, there has been a real effect
OF the growers and the spinners to
get together and control the crop
that they both depend on for a
livelihood and to eliminate the mid
dieman and the cotton gambler who
have both fat,ened for generations
out OF handling the crop. There
has eeen convention this week in
Washington of the growers and the
mill men. There have been repre-
sentatives from the great mills of
OF England and from all the assoc
iations in the United States inter
ested in the handling of cotton.
These included the Associations of
Manufacturers, the Southern Cotton
Association, the National Cotton
Manufacturers Association, the
Farmers Educational Union and
several other bodies. 1t was
striking gathering to see and a more
interesting one to listen TO. There
were the correctly dressed and con-
ventional mill men of England who
are now on o tour of the United
States, the equally correct though
more alert and aggressive manu-
facturers from New England, the
younger men of the South, both
those interested in mills and in
growing cotton, and there were the
men of the fields who came, many
OF them without neckties, the first
OF that style that the fashionable
hotel where they met has never
seen. And there was even one
old gentleman who came in suit
OF Confederate gray with brass
buttons and regimental badge on
his coat. He made a talk in the
course OF the meeting. and it was q
mighty good talk too. He told
how he came representing the farm
ers of Texas, the men who raised
from half bale to five bales for a
crop and who were tired of work
ing for bare existance and hypot-
hecating their crop before il had put
its head above the ground. He
said that the farmers he represented
were waking up, that they had
found The virtue of warehousinR and
holding their crop for decent mark
ct conditions before selling it, and
that they would hold the crop with
the help of Heaven and southern
money till they could get decent
price for it and not live from hand
to mouth on the bounty of the
middleman and the country store
keeper. There were Congressmen
too, Livingston of Georgia, and
Elberle Of South Carolina, both of
them practical cotton farmers and
they gave the convention some
straight talk as to the exactions of
the meat trust which had forced the
south to raise its own food supplies
and had thus taught them that per
haps there was after all living IN
other hings beside cotton on the
southern farm.
1t was rather pathetic 10 see that
all Of the advances we're made by
the growers TO the manufacturer.
The growers explained that they
had found through much tribulation
that there was money to be made,
though they had never made any
before, in warehousing their crop
and holding it till there was a legi-
mate demand tor it from the mills.
They said that the warehouses we're
being built rapidly, that the cotton
was being protected from the wealth.
er watch had ruined so much Of IL
In the fields, and that they we're
cleaning and grading it in the ware
houses in accordance with the best
that they understood Of the mill
owners demands. This being so,
they ask merely that the mill men
should deal direct with them instead
Of with the middlemen and specu.
iators and they promised If this
we're done 10 estimate the actual
cost Of raising the crop and to di.
vide profits fairly.
The reply Of the spinners was
suaye and was that Of polished
business men. They we're glad to
know that the cotton was being
better taken care Of and that il
would reach them in better condiu.
on. And they would be glad to
deal direct with the growers il that
would get them the cotton cheaper,
and II the warehousing scheme was
effective. II IN short they had TO-.