Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1920-03-19

NASu6ht JACK mere again IL tney
want to see the fine ranch they
bought last summer for anywhere
from $500 to $4,000 per acre, drop
in value to less than $1,000 per acre?
IL they want to be compelled to sell
their prunes for a two-cent base or
less, or let them rot on the ground
under the trees? Ii they want to
give up the plans for new house
and better automobile this year?
In fact, | want to ask them if they
are anxious to slip back 10 years in
time and progress and try to do all
over again the Herculean tasks that
have been accomplished in that time
by a few wise, earnest men, who
have thought of the future of the
fruit industry in California, and of
the happiness and prosperity OF
their children and their children j
children?
For Just as surely as the sun
shall rise over Mt Hamilton tomor-
row morning SO surely will these
conditions prevail in this state
among the fruit growers if the Cal
ifornia Prune and Apricot Growers,
Inc, shall so to pieces And it will
so to pieces ii the required acreage
is not signed up by the time set, so
that the forces of the organization
may be turned toward the markets,
their natural function.
The last two years have been bad
for the California Prune and Apricot
Growers, Inc, in this way: The
unprecedented prices for the fruit
stimulated the sales of land as no.
thing ever had done before; conse-
quently many ranches, large and
small, changed hands. Now the
contract with the growers organiza-
| ton is made with the rancher and
not with the ranch, so that when a
ranch passes from one owner to an
other the contract with the growers
association lapses unless the new
owner signs up a new contract This
has not been done in many cases Oh
transfer of acreage, so that the per-
centage of acreage in the growers
association has fallen far below the
necessary Is per cent, and very far
below the desired 80 per cent. This
is why the work of signing up the
acreage has to be done practically
all over again. And this is why the
organization is certain to be a fail
ure unless the new owners of acre
age, and more of the old non-mem-
Der owners, get into the organiza.
ton right now.
There is class of owner who al
most, if not quite, holds the fate OF
this organization in his hands today
and that is the man known in the
organization circles as the Non
Member Grower" He is the man
who, for some reason or other, has
refused to get into the organization,
| but has profited just as much from
the big prices as any member of the
organization. He knows that the
| big prices were solely due to the
organization and the efforts of the
| Independent packers to disrupt it
by boosting the prices to what they
believed would be a ruinous high
plane. These non-member growers
have exhibited most singular and
mistaken selfishness in thus refus-
ing to maintain an organization that
is making them rich; an organization
that has changed the conditions
from those of 1907 to those of 1919
in the fruit industry of California:
singular because the California
rancher is not, as a rule, narrow or
mean; and mistaken, because they
can not possibly have any foundation
for hoping that the organization
can, or will, carry them along indef-
initely. The organization has too
many natural enemies among the
grafters and profiteers of the in
dependent packers to fight without
being compelled to waste precious
munitions of war upon the very peo-
pie it is doing the most for. 1t
seems mighty queer to me that any
fruit grower would dare the chances
| of failure of the organization by
staying out of it. l can not under
sind why every grower isn't crowd
ing into the offices of the organiza-
ton today trying to get his name
upon the rolls of loyal supporters
of the association that means for
him the difference between prosper
ity and bankruptcy. If the men in
any other line of business or indus
tru had such an organization that