The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1916-11-30
APPLE
CROP HARVESTED
l6 MILE TRAIN WOULD Be REQUIRED
7 100000 Feet Of Lumber Used in Boxes
-2l Carloads Of Paper. and 40
=, Tons OF Nails Used

Literally speaking, the town of Hoed
River is fairly bursting with apples.
The cold rooms of storage plants have
been filled to.capaclty, ssand:aisles and
areaways. have been piled to the cell
ing with tier after tier of bulging box.
es. Every available vacant--space in
the city is being loaded with fruit. The
Easements of business blocks. empty
amusement halls and storerooms and 9
vacated parlor of funeral director
have been turned into apple receiving
stations and now give forth the fra.
grant aroma of the Spitzenburg, the
Newton and the Northern Spy,
And still the wagons of growers in
long files daily unload their burdens OF
luscious fruit. Practically every sec.
tion of the towns business district
during the daylight hours and until late
in the evening presents scenes typical
of the produce and commission quarters
of large cities. Store fronts, the win.
dows of which may display tobaccos OF
candies, socks or shirts, or the product
of a grocer, are partially obscured al
times by the piled up heaps of fruit
boxs. Business men, merchants and
professional men are assisting in every
manner in the protection of the great
apple crop. The Apple is now truly
King in Hood River.
Even at this late date the estimates
of the 1916 yield of fruit continues to
swell. The Hood River apple crop il
now conservatively placed at l,500, Que
boxes of fruit. and officials of sales
agencies say that at minimum figure
of /, 200, 600 boxes of commercial varie.
ties and grades have been packed fol
distribution.
The magnitude of the 1916 Hood
River apple crop may be grasped when
it is announced that total of more
than 5000 men, women and children
were needed in the harvest. The great
quantity of fruit may be further COM
pretended when furher statistics gath.
cred on the material used IN packing
the fruit, is digested.
While the minimum quantity of ap.
Piles loaded on refrigerator car is 63C
boxes, because of shortage of freezers
this season, an average of approxi-
nately 700 boxes will be shipped in
each car. When the season is ended,
it will have required LIZA cars to han
die the apple crop. A refrigerator car,
from croupler to coupler, measures ap-
proxiately so feet. A solid train car
rying all of the packed apples of the
Hood River valley would reach a dis
tance of approximately 16 miles. about
one.fourth the distance from Hood
River to Portland.
Every apple shipped from Hood Riv-
er, packed in one Of the three gradse--
extra fancy, fancy or c grade requires
a paper wrapper. Each box requires
two sheets of lining paper and three
sheets of layer cardboard. Twenty-one
carloads of paper were the require
ments for the 1916 crop.
Figuring six feet to the box, a total
Of 1900, 600 feet of lumber we're used
in making apple boxes this year. Each
box requires in the making 80 cement
nails, of which there are $4,000 to the
keg' approximately 1000 kegs. OF
40 ton of these nails were driven into
the boxes. The boxes cost growers an
average of 10a cents each, the total
outlay being $3.50, 1000.
The total Northwestern apple crop is
figured at an approximate 20. 600 cars.
or $4,000, 900 boxes. Statistical data
on the entire crop may be obtained,
approximately, by multiplying HOOD
River figures by II.