The ranch. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1902-1914, 1907-03-15
A New Plan for Handling City Milk.


in the shape Of a milk company that
proposes to revolutionize the trade by
cutting out the city establishments and
toner direct, writes Joseph w. Cham
berlain. 1t is a rather daring venture
and in a measure piratical, for no milk
routes are to be bought, the company
assuming that it is so much superior
to any existing ones, that it is perfectly
proper for it to go into the field and
solicit trade anywhere. This part of
the venture has already begun and it is
reported that about one consumer in
four will agree to take milk next May,
when the company is ready to deliver.
1t already has bought farms to the ag-
have money enough to meet all require
ments till the enterprise is on paying
basis.
The plan is to begin with 1000 COWS
and to increase the number as the sales
increase till the entire capacity of the
land is taken up, and possibly more
land may be bought if the proceeds look
right. The plan is to put the sanitary
control in the hands of a well known
city physician and make him responsible
financial interest in the farm. The milk
will be drawn by milking machines,
which deliver it without it ever COM
ing to the open air, so that it is as
pure as it is made. It will be bottled
on the spot, put into ice and never
handled till it comes from the car on
arrival in the city direct to the GUS
toner.
In this way it will be possible to de-
liver the mornings milk in a few hours
after it is produced and there will never
be any milk more than about Is hours
old and no mixing of the milk of sew
eral COWS together or from night to
morning. An expert, not here connect
ed with the company, has been figuring
on the probable outcome and says that
the company ought to be able to put
the milk on the car for two cents a
quart, then it may cost two cents more
to market it, for there will need to be
the equipment Of bottles and teams in
the city, so that there Is a possible
two cents profit, for the company an
nounces that it will sell milk for six
cents a quart and no more.
There is to be an advanced plan of
handling the cows, which includes soil
ing for the most part, with liberal
amount Of silage in the feed as soon
as it can be made. It is not known
who the expert manager Is to be, but
it is said that he will need to take
hold very vigorously, as some rather
odd ideas crop out now and then. For
instance it seems to be the plan to take
all of these thousand cows out of the
stable to some special place for milk
ing, to make sure Of having 1t clean,
but experts have laughed at the notion,
for anywhere a cow goes there is sure
to be some dirt, not to mention the time
this regulation would take.
The use Of milking machines that will
stand between the milk and any dirt or
bacteria that may be about Is really the
chief advance made in the venture, as
that has not yet been tried to any extent
anywhere. 1t is really such an entire
solution of this worst of all problems in
the production of milk that all others
drop into utter insignificance before It,
If the physician in charge sees to 1t that
the milk is kept away from the air, as
is quite possible if the proper pains is
taken, there will be milk produced that
will be above suspicion, which is not
the case with any milk known to the
public yet, so long as it is handled at all
after it leaves the stable, no matter how
pure it may be then.
It is true that there are many city
establishments that are kept up to the
highest possible standard, but it is a
difficult matter to take the evil out
of milk after it is once allowed to get
in 1t, whether in the form of plain dirt