The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1913-04-12


over the tariff situation) keep us from
reaping profits which have been praC-
tically assured? Is not ), . or even 1
cent per pound extra profit induce
ment enough to keep up this indus
try. One cent per pound on the aver
age cotton crop of Darlington coun-
ty means nearly one quarter of mil
lion dollars per year.
My own view is that we should
abandon short cotton entirely in this
section. cannot conceive of a sit
uation arising which would cause
good long staple cotton to bring less
than short staple and / do not expect
good long staple to bring less than 2
or cents per pound premium next
season. But you must be sure to have
good cotton, raised from pure pedi-
greed seed. Lots of the staple seed
i'm the county are becoming badly
mixed and cotton from such seed may
may be very difficult of sale and
bring very low prices. Besides, seed
of the old, small boiled, non-produc-
tive staple varieties offered under va
rious names. These cottons were for
merly grown in this section i'm small
quantities and no mill man that I
have ever talked to who has used
any Of them wants to see another
bale. 1t was the bad reputation of
these old staple cottons which made
II so hard to convince the spinners
that our new staple had any merit.
Our ginners are rapidly learning
how to handle staple cotton and
many of them have their plants ad-
justed to run the long rather than
the short product. Where both long
and short are planted in close prox-
unity they will almost surely be-
come mixed either by crossing in
the field or by mixture of seed at
the gins. The whole problem Of
seed selection and ginning is rem
dered immensely more difficult by
the planting of several kinds Of cot
ton.
Instead OF turning back to short
cotton the farmer should. / think,
turn their attention to seed selec-
tion, to good handling, baling and
ginning, and should bend their en-
ergies to sustaining and increasing
the reputation we have already made
for our staple cotton. II they in
sist on planting both long and short
cotton together, or in reintroducing
the old discredited sorts; IL they
fail to pay attention TO keeping up
the character and quality of our ex-
cellent staple varieties; If they al
low short cotton to become mixed
with their staple at the gins or put
up in rough and ragged bales; we
will simply lose what we have gain
ed and a promising and profitable
industry will be destroyed.
There has never been q day since
/ have been in business in Harts-
Vile when a bale of good honest cot
ton, whether long or short. could
not be sold here at its approximate
value. There has never been a day
when good staple cotton would not
bring a premium over short cotton.
and. while 1 make no promise rs to
the future, I see no excuse for be-
neving that such q day will ever
come. 1 do believe. however, that
the staple premiums prevailing next
year will be much lower than those
prevailing for the last two years.
To those farmers who insist on
planting short any way I recommend
Pride Of Georgia." cleveland Big
Boil" Jones Big Boil" and the
cotton called the Five Lock" and
formerly planted extensively around
Ashland. While my tests show that
they are less productive on an aver
age than Hartsville No. Z, Webber
or decentralization. they are among
the best short cotton 1 have tested
and possess the big advantage of be-
ing easy to pick. They will all
make high grade lint OF good char
acter and are much more quickly
gathered than small boiled cottons.
Hoping that the farmers, merchI
ants. professional men and newspa-
pers in this section will cooperate
IN maintaining the new staple in
dustry which has already added To
profits OF our farmers, and that you.
MT Editor, will give publicity to
this letter, l am, yours truly.
David II. Coker.
I'D PRESS COTTON OIL CASE.