The Hawaiian star., 1910-08-17
COTTON STANDARD
GIVEN To TRADE

Sample boxes of the STANDARD cot
ton samples" by which the immense
crop of the United States is graded
and sold are being sent out by the
Department of Agriculture, says the
Washington Star. The work was
done by a special committee of men
familiar with the conditions of the
trade and selected by the Secretary
of Agriculture not only because of
their technical skill and standing in
the business world, but because of
their exceptionally high personal
characteristics. The reason that so
much care was taken in this selection
was because there is only a microscop-
ic difference in the variation of cotton
from grade to grade, and while there
is very small actual advance in
price from grade to grade, the aggre.
gate of the cotton crop last year was
$3.50, 100000, so that a very small diff
ference in the grading of cotton would
make an immense difference in the to-
tai value of the crop, both to growers
and buyers
The standard grade samples are
put up in sets of nine boxes by the
Department, representing nine grades
of white American cotton. But while
this serves as sufficient grading
standard, The trade recognizes n grade
between each of the nine established
by the government and three grades
above and tnee below the government
scale. The cotton buyer on getting
his box Of standard grade samples,
uses it TO mat'h the cotton that IS
brought to him for sale.
A standard box is sold by the de.
partmcnt fer $35 and with gcod care
will last year or more before it be-
gins to deteriorate.
What the department considers It's
greatest triumph is in fixing the
original samples so that they would
not deteriorate or change color.
There has never been a permanent
cotton standard sample in the history
of the world, the reason being that it
has never been possible to keep the
standards from deteriorating.
In the present instance, after the
standard grades have been selected
with the greatest care by the commit
tee of experts, they were put in big
glass tubes, the air exhausted and the
tubes sealed just like an incandes.
cent light globe. In fact the actual
work was done at one Of the big
electric globe plants.
The standards have beer officially
adopted by the Memphis Cotton Ex
| change, approved and will probably
be adopted by the New York and the
New Orleans exchanges. 1t was hop
! ed to have the big European countries
| represented on the standard commit
tee, because a third of the Americar
crop is sold abroad and it is very de-
sirable to have foreigners adopt the
same standard as America The
standard samples have been largely
approved by English buyers who hav,
seen them, but they have not yet beer
officially presented to any of the for
eign exchanges.
The men who established the cott0r
standards We're some of the biggest
and best known men in the trade
They were Joseph A. Airy of John M
Parker & Co., New Orleans; James
Akers, of Inman, Akers & Inman, At
lanta, Ga; F. M. Crump, of F. M
Crump & Company, Memphis. Tenn.
c p. Baker, of the Lawrence
Manufacturing Company, Boston
Mass; Lewis w. Parker, of tn,
Olypmia Cotton Mills, Green
vile, s. c.; John Martin, of Paris
Texas; Nathaniel Thayer, of Barry
Thayer & Co., Boston; George w. Ne
vile, of Weld & Neville, New York
and Charles A. veder, of John D. Ro
gers e. Co., Galveston. Tex.
The committee was assisted by w
p Barbot, of the classification com
mittee of the New York Cotton FY