The Wenatchee daily world. [volume] (Wenatchee, Wash.) 1905-1971, 1909-10-25
TELLS Of WESTERN
ORCHARDS
v. WOEHLKE IN THE
CURRENT NUMBER OF OUT
LOOK HAS INTERESTING STORY
OF WESTERN ORCHARDS.

In the Service of Quality" is the
heading of a story in the current
number of the Outlook, by Walter v
Woehlke. The story deals with west
ern orcharding and contains cut OF
tree of Winesap apples grown in
the Wenatchee valley. This is the
same picture that is on the Chelan
County A.-Y.-P. booklet. The story
is very interesting one and the fol-
lowing is short excerpt of 1t:
For more than half a century New
York state has been famous for the
apples it produces; the fate of the
Delaware peach crop has become a
matter of national concern every
spring; the reputation of Florida S
oranges is older even than that of
New York state apples. Along the
Atlantic seaboard in the south, in por-
tions of the middle west, orchards
We're in blossom and bore fruit before
gold was found in California, at a
time when Puget sound was remoter
from New York than Cape Town or
China. And yet. with the accumulat-
ed experience of a hundred years and
more at their disposal, the eastern
fruit growers are going west to learn
their business. Twenty years ago
Florida laughed at the puny attempt
of the Californians to enter the east
ern markets with their oranges. This
spring fifty of Florida's representa-
tive orange growers crossed the con-
tinent to study the California methods
of growing, packing and marketing
the citrus crop. Fifteen years ago
Oregon and Washington imported ap-
pies from the east for home consump-
ton
Last year scores of eastern apple
buyers travelled the gray sage brush
valleys and fir clad mountains of the
Pacific northwest inspecting the
young orchards growing on the bare
hilsijes, in an endeavor to discover
the cause of the high prices western
apples were bringing in the east.
What they saw caused many of them
to hurry home, put an AK to their
venerable trees and make a new
start along lines developed on the
Pacific coast.
The lessons impaired to the east
ern fruit growers in the far west was
short and concise It's main theme,
recurring in every phase of the bust
ness, from the planting of the tree to
the marketing of the crop, was quail
ity. And to the average unit of
democracy the lesson of quality is
hard to master because the tendency
of the mass, as opposed to the class,
expressed itself in mediocrity. The
service of quality is hard; it required
sustained effort, thorough training.
The continued application of foresight
and judgment, as against the nearly
automatic performance in the tread
mill of mediocrity; but it's rewards
are proportionately greater. The Cal
ifornian's average net income of two
hundred dollars per acre was the
magnet that drew the Florida orange
growers to the Golden state. The
eastern growers of deciduous fruits
had heard of carloads of pears grown
in the Rogue river valley of Oregon
that sold for three and four thousand
dollars, of pears that brought five,
six and even eight cents a piece,
wholesale, in New York city, when
their own pears sold for but a small
fraction of these prices; they had
heard of consignments of apples sent
from the Hood River valley in Ore
gon. and the Wenatchee valley in
to London, there to set
new price records in competition with
the most famous fruits of the Old
World. They had heard of apple, pear
and cherry orchards of the Pacific |
coast yielding a thousand dollars and
more per acre in a year; startling |
tales of the earnings were the re- /
wards paid by quality to the faithful
Loilers in its service.
'Intrinsically eastern fruit is in no
way inferior to the product of the
Pacific coast. The best grade of ap-I
pies grown in New York state need
fear no comparison with the apple of
the west. But only the highest grade
can stand the test, for the $4,000
cars of fruit and fruit products that /
roll over the passes of the
Rockies, eastward bound, are filled
with only the choicest portion of the
western fruit crop. The balance stays
It home. This process Of segregating
he best from the inferior Is perhaps
he chief cause of the western hOrti-
surprising success. 1t WAS
lot adopted by choice. Circumstances
it's introduction. When the
Increasing output of the early groves
orced the growers to find new out
of for tho surnlus other than the