Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1917-12-16
By JAMES B. MORROW.
HE Sweets. Lou and Frank.


unrelated. They are not even
cousins Of the forty second va
q riety. But they are partners
and comrades. and 80 their acquaint-
ances and customers call them broth
ers. Regarding the dissimilarity of
their faces and manners. it is explained
that one of the brothers looks like his
mother and the other like his father.
This matter having been settled con-
clusively, other subjects. personal and
general. are brought forward and con-
sidered. AS. for example, What do
you calculate were their profits last
year,
All of the answers to this interesting
inquiry are phrased in no less than six
figures. A small sum. II the six were
all mines, one might say. in this era of
billions. voted and disbursed offhand.
But the Sweets are farmers.
Specifically, they are growers OF po-
tatoes. Whether the nations Of the
earth are dwelling together like breth-
rem or trying to butcher and extermi-
nate one another. the Sweets make
money season after season.
Shares may shoot up or down. bonds
may default or pay their interest, mer-
chandtse may move or sleep in ware
houses and stores, but the Sweets. read
business. see nothing and feel nothing
except the fairest of fine weather. And
30 they are famous men in the markets
of the west and among the scientists of
the Department Of Agriculture.
What Carnegie was to the steel in
dustvy and xrbaf RocE faJIar u,,s 70 ~.
oil industry, Lou D. Sweet was and now
is to the potato industry. A master,
however, and not monopolist, He
says to the potato, Grow and it
grows; and to the devouring beetle,
right in its own Colorado habitat, Co.
and 1t obeys.
A small featured. large headed. blue
eyed. middling sized man, both in inches
and weight. Lou Sweet is sixty. per-
haps, although in energy and enthu
siasm he Is still youthful enough to he
his own son-in-law. His dress is like a
merchants or manufacturers. He
lights a cigar, and then, remembering.
probably. his Doctors admonition
throws it away.
Hoover. OF course, heard of him. And
so Lou sweet is in Washington and emu
listed III the army that Is battling with
the Prussians-the commander-in-chief
OF all the potatoes in the land and of
their producers and dealers as well
Can he manage thcm-the dealers, more
particularly?
When the interviewer repeated the
Washington retail quotation OF 81 80 a
bushel, Mr.. Sweet looked surprised and
graphically remarked. Its the peoples
fault"
'"rhey will reform" the interviewer
said. Ii you give them workable pro-
gram
Let them study the way Of Dem
mark. Mr.. Sweet answered. meaning
thereby, possibly. the Danish machin-
cry OF cooperative buying, or the
movement of food straight from the
field to the household.
THE war" he continued stonninp bts
explanation ore it began, will work
many changes in the American methods
of doing business"
Here was q hint. II seemed, of perna-
nent government supervision in some
directions. Nothing further. however
was offered. Is the middieman doomed
in the plans of President Wilson and
the food administrators Or, il NOT
doomed, is he to be regulated after the
Huns are conquered?
Whatever else may happen" Mr.
Sweet said. as he slid away from the
shadow of great vital question. 1--WE
mean to change pecks and bushels into
pounds with respect to potatoes and
have purchases made by weight in
stead OF measure,
Should the purchaser" he asked. a
* stating moral hypothesis and not
limiting at q commercial fact ssbA given
anywhere from nina to twelve pounds