Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-10-29
Ashburn's CREAMERY
his keenly interesting account o.


Ashburn creamery, in yesterdays Jour
nal, Ralph Smith showed with what
generous enterprise and goodly promise
Georgia community is essaylng to solve
those joint problems of business and agrl-
culture in which the entire Commonwealth IS
now materially concerned
Seeing that the ravages of the boil weevll
made imperative the production OF other
crops than cotton, certain leading citizens OF
Turner county's thrifty capital began to con-
slider how they best might aid their farmer
neighbors in meeting the demands of new
day. AS practical-minded, publ1c-splrlted
men they realized that the welfare Of the
town was vitality involved with that of coun-
try, and that only by working literally to-
gether for the common good could they
avert a common ill. 1t was their especial
duty, they reasoned, to provide markets for
the foodstufs which planters were counsel
ed to raise in place of cotton-and when
ever the rank and file of Georgia business
leaders come resolutely to that same con-
clusion, the great problem which The Jour
nal and the Country Bankers Association
are endeavOring to clarity will be swiftly on
the way to solution.
Having a will, the Ashburn citizens soon
found way. They looked into the young
dairy Industries of Dallas county, Alabama,
and found that that one community is ex-
porting annually upwards of two million
four hundred thousand dollars worth of
butter and kindred products. On closer in
vestigation they found that the grasses
which sustain the Alabama establishments
flourish even more luxuriantly in their own
region, and that all the other basal re-
sources are there in abundance. Thus in
formed, ffty-fve Of them subscribed one
hundred dollars each, which they in
vested in butter-making plant of the most
approved type While the machinery was
being installed, they secured the services OF
an expert butter maker; and now the
creamery is a going concern, turning out on
the day of Mr.. Smiths visit some four hun
dred and ninety pounds of butter, uneXcelled
In richness and popularity, all of which was
: sold in advance to a Western packing house
that markets it throughout the country.
Praise be to enterprise which has reversed
the inefficient role that Georgia too long has
played, giving her in at least one instance
the part of an exporter and profit-taker in
foodstuffs!
How well the creamery serves the larger
purpose for which it was established-that
is, the encoura cement of dairying in the ad-
iacent country, and of the system of agrl-
culture on which dairying rests and to which
it in turn contributes-may be gathered
from Mr.. Smiths statement touching the
farmers side of the undertaking. They
are being advised he says, "to begin their
operations with such cows as they have.
There is at the present time, with surplus
corn, velvet beans and other crops, album
dant feedstuff. After separating the whole
milk obtained from the and shipping
the cream to Ashburn, the SKINNED milk is
to be fed to the hogs. There is nothing bet
ter for fattening pigs. The fertilizer OF
cows and the hogs will enrich the soil, here
tofore impoverished by cotton and other
crops. The returns from the cream will
furnish the farmer with ready cash, and as
the possibilities of the program are appre-
ciated, other and better dairy cattle may be
purchased"
The lesson which Ashburns enterprise
holds for Georgia is, not that other towns
should rush into creamery ventures, for now
there would not be enough cream to keep
them going, the Turner county plant being
itself under-supplied. But the spirit of mi
tiative and cooperation which Ashburn so
richly exemplifies may well be emulated by
all communities that wish to conserve their
own and the Commemorative interests in
these times of economic crisis and change