Norwich bulletin., 1921-03-17
PACKINGHoUsE MANAGER
 SPEAKS BEFORE ROTARIANs

The packing industry, it's history and growth, was ably told by Charles H. Si- mons of Boston, New England manager of swift & O., and past president of the Boston Rotary club, in a brief talk before the Norwich Rotary club on We'd nesday noon at the regular monday lun- cheon at the Wauregan house.
 Mir. Simons came as the guest of Her bert c. Adams, local manager for Swift & O., who presided at the meeting. Mir Simons, before taking up the main topic of his talk, spoke briefly on the pro- gramme for the New England conference of the Rotary clubs saying that every member of Rotary should make an ex- tra effort to attend the conference as if would be really worth while. Dr. Frank Crane is Q be speaker at the meeting and general good time is planned.
 In speaking of the paQking industry, MT. Simons said Sat it really started in the early 70s when four young men. who had been en,s ged in various lines \of business drifted Into Chicago. These men were MT. Armour, G. F. Swift, Nelson Morris and George IT. Hammond All founded a packing business which as time progressed took on proportions until to- day three of the original four companies constitute the largest packers in the world. These three are Armour and Company,
  | the Hammond interests having been ab- sorbed by the others.
 People have very mistaken idea of packing People many times ask us about the cattle we raise. We do not | raise cattle, except maybe nv. blooded | stock which it doesn't pay to kill for beef. The cattle are bought from the commission man who trades in lives -ock | In the old days meat was cheap and peo- l Tlo Odo ta hi fOly as cheap as 30 years ago. When I was a | young man I went to the vest to take ur | ranching. located in Nebraska. This state, with Kansas, Missouri, Wyoming | Montana, and several other states wes l of the Mississippi, was the cattle country | Great herds roamed the plains and hill' at large and the cost of feeding :hen
 and caring for them was small In Ne braska the average population was abou
 l person to every square mile, but q 1910 the average was 55.5 persons whicl
 showed that the cattle had been crowd
 ed out by the farm and sheep ranch
 Now Wyoming and Montana are the cat
 tie states,--Montana having 2.6 persons t
 square mile and Wyoming Is per
 sons. Cattle in other states are cor fed which naturally entails more cost nc only for feed but for labor. The cat tie received by the packers are about 8
 
 cost more We will never see the ol : prices again for this reason.
 The cattle from the ranges are driI en to the stock yards in various part l. of the country and are then sold frol the yards by the commission broker |
 the highest bidder. It is not large da l when the packers pay out $1,000,00O fC ] stock. The cattle are then shipped to u
 Chicago yards or other places to be Xiii
 | ad haip ,.Ia
 ed in a refrigerator to take out tn
 1 animal heat. We hear lots of tai
 about frozen beef but in reality there none at all The refrigerators are kel ,: at temperature of 32 to 40 degrees. IT T shipping temperature in the cars is abo | the same. Every car is sterilized b = fore being filled and is iced sever:
 times Of it's srip to the east, so it a n rives here in the best of condition ar T it is then put out to the retailers almo Q immediately.
 7, We also hear about the packer bei1 T. a profiteer and today it would seem tn T the packer who hasn't been indicted is l. piker. The truth of the matter is tn a an injustice has been done the packer y In 1919 we made only 1.16 cents pro II on a dollar turn over, and less than T per o1lt of the surplus. In 1920 Il e profit was only mills on the dollar al we had to take money from the surpll l. to pay the interest The packers we n through the war with as clean a reco as any business and we shipped 500 ca
 of meat a week to the government IT y labor board regulated the wages and nc there is where the trouble lies. The d laborers think that the war time wag l. should still be paid.
 y I am proud to be connected with tf e business, they are good lot of r U blooded men who play for big stakes al 1T take big losses.
 e MT. Simons was given rising vote
 appreciation fer his very interesting al e instructive talk.
 n The musical part of the luncheon W 1T enlivened by several selections by t s' Sweet and Low Quartette," George ! S. Carroll, tenor, Otto Ernst, second ten ss John A. Fergasor, bass and Charles r. Saxton, second bass. Roy Nash of N, ,r London and Henry LaFontaine also 1 IT. vored with several pleasing and W S. rendered solos.
 n- A large number of the members q se nifed their intention of attending t IS New England conference at Boston n; March 3Oth. There were about 50 pr ro ent at the meeting including Several (
 of town guests.