The weekly chieftain. [volume] (Vinita, Craig County, Okla.) 1905-1913, 1912-09-20
THE GREAT TRUCK AND FRUIT
INDUSTRY OF THE SOUTH
WEST.
A Meeting is Called at Dallas, Texas,
October 19, to Provide a -Four
States" Exchange to Market the
Products of Texas, Arkansas, Lou
isiana and Oklahoma.

middle, northern or eastern part of
the United States, when he goes to
market from January to June TO buy
vegetables and fruits for his table,
hardly ever gives a passing thought
to the section of country from which
these food products come, or of the
people who spend the winter months
delving in the soil, planting and tend
ing the vast acres from which the
early vegetables and fruits to feed the
nation are produced. All that the
consumer realizes is that the price is
high and the days are few and far
between When there is a plentiful as
sortment to choose from. II he gets
any idea about the producer it is that
he is some sort of highway robber
who makes the poor consumer OF
the north pay double prices. He does
not realize the magnitude of the fruit
and truck growing industry of the
southwest from which he gets his
SUPPLIES, ne QOCb NV hhON 1A4e~S NNNA4J
growers labor all winter, spend their
time and money for months, and then
in many cases get no pay when the
shipping season comes on. IL con-
sumer we're told this fact, he would
growl back that it was no fault of
his. Goodness knows, | pay enough"
he says. And he does. The u. 5.
Department of Agriculture has figured
it out that for ordinary farm crops
the consumer pays one dollar, where
the producer receives only 46 cents.
The balance is expense and loss un-
der our outrageous marketing system
in getting the productions of the farm,
from the farm to the home of the con-
sumer. The fellow who "has it in"
for corporations in general and the
railroads in particular, will say that
Sthe railroads get it. But this is not
true. The railroads and the refriger-
ator car companies get about 20 per
cent of it. the balance is divided be-
tween dealers profits and loss occa-
stoned by bad system of marketing
AS a matter of fact, ON perishable
products which have to be rushed to
the markets or the cold storage houses
as soon as they come from the fields
J and orchards, do not begin to pay the
producer 46 cents for every dollars
worth the consumer buys. On the
gross amount he produces, large part
of which is lost through lack of sys-
tenn in putting it into he hands of the
consumer, distributing it to the multi
tude of markets in proportion to their
ability to consume it, the growers do
not on the average get one-half OF
forty-six cents out of every dollars
worth produced.
AS an example o fthis, some Texas
onion growers could give their expert
ences this year One grower at Ash
erton sent four cars of white Bermu-
das to the market and actually had to
pay out of his pocket 1855 in order to
give them away! Yet, at the very
time the consumers, buying in small
quantities, were paying for these same
onions FIVE cents a pound, or twelve
hundred dollars per car One OF the
biggest onion growers in Texas, sum
ming up his profits on sixty-two cars,
found that it did not amount to enough
TO pay the hands for gathering and
<storing the sorghum used to feed the
stock on his farm. In one day at Hous-
ton. Texas, forty carloads of water
melons were sold by the railroad COM
panies and did not bring enough
money to pay the freight, yet there
were hundreds of thousands of people
in these United States who would
have been glad OF the opportunity of
buving these melons at a good price.
Peaches. fine Elbertas, have on the
same day sold at twenty-five cents per
crate in one market and at eighty-hve
cents in another not hundred miles
distant. Such instances could be enum-
Grated every season by the hundreds.
The business man, if his attention
were called to this condition, would
remark that the reason was, there was
not enough business, or money in the
business, to pay the expense OF main
tanning a shipping organization suffici-
emily extensive to intelligently distrl-
butte these fruit and truck products.
Perhaps not, yet during the season
inst ended the four states of Texas
Oklahoma. Arkansas and Louisiana
shipped approximately 99,40O solid car
loads of these food products, consist
ing of 1000 cars of Strawberries, l2'Ooo
cars of peaches, 1000 cars of water
melons. 600 cars of cantaloupes' 3oO
cars of beans, 800 cars of cucumbers'
100 cars of lettuce, 1000 cars OF to-