The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1922-05-27
SUMTER
TOBACCO
MARKET
Growers Cooperative
Association Will Be Repre-
sented i'm Sumter and Will
Help to Build Up the
Market

Help to Build Up the
Market
The business men Of Sumter are
backing up the Tobacco Growers
Cooperative Marketing Association
enthusiastically. On last Monday
q representative number of Sum
ter business men, members of the
Young Mems Business League and
the Sumter Chamber of Commerce,
held a joint cooperative, sell the
idea to the tobacco growers meet
ing in the Sumter Chamber of
Commerce. County Agent j.
Frank Williams and several other
farmers were present.
Mr.. w. E. Lea, OF Florence, and
Mr.. Reeves, representing the To-
bacco Association were also pres
ent. Mr.. Lea delivered a very in
teresting and convincing talk. ex-
planning the objects and benefits of
the association, and showed con-
vincingly wherein the tobacco
growers have been losing hundreds
of millions of dollars by the old
time auction method of selling to-
bacco. The farmers in totally dis
organized form have been COM
pletely at the mercy of the tobac-
CO companies who arbitrarily fixed
tobacco prices to suit themselves
both in the prices paid the farmer
and in the greatly Increased prices
which the tobacco companies and
factories received in selling tobac-
CO in manufactured shape to the
consumers. Every business man
and every farmer at this meeting
heartily agreed that they will give
of their time, influence, and WORK.
ing cooperation to organize Sumter
county, if possible N hundred peg
cent strong for the Tobacco Asso-
citation. 1t was finally agreed that
the Young Mems Business League
and the Sumter Chamber Of Com
merce. assisted by Mr.. Reeves,
County Agent Williams and many
other leading farmers of the coun-
ty, Will provide not less than ten
! automobiles for each organization
and that numbers of Sumter's lead-
ing merchants, bankers, manufac-
turers, and other business and pro-
fesSional men will put on county
wide campaign by visiting the to-
bacco growers who have not signed
up as members. In the meantime
membership applications are to be
had at the Sumter Chamber of
Commerce, where Messrs. Reeves
and Williams have their head
quarters and those who wish to can
sign up at any time.
It was clearly Indicated by Mr..
Lea's address that the Tobacco
Growers Cooperative Marketing
Association, while not showing any
partisanship to any particular to-
bacco market. intends to do every
thing within its power to help to
make the Sumter market the Kind
of a market 1t is legitimately Ell
titled to be because of its splendid
tobacco marketing facilities in its
up to date tobacco stemnery and
large tobacco Warehouses, excep-
tional railway distributing facili-
ties, labor conditions and splendid
tobacco producing farming land.
The Tobacco Association seeks TO
build up, not tear down tobacco
markets, and the chief objects of
the association are to sell the farm
ers' tobacco at the. very highest
possible prices at the minimum cost
of selling. The Tobacco Growers
Cooperative Association is a splen-
didly and Systematically organic
ed business institution, with the
best business brains of the south
managing it through its boards Of
directors over the whole south.
Bankers, farmers, merchants, man
ufacturers. experienced tobacco
graders, warehousemen, and x
perts knowing the tobacco business
from one end to the other are the
men who will be backing and man
aging the associations affairs.
Sumter's tobacco market can be
made one Of the biggest and best
in the south, with the right kind
Of cooperation between the tobac-
co growers and the business men
of Sumter, and that is what the
association aims at, among other
things, to get the business men of
Sumter and other cities and towns
to pulling together to get the
highest possible prices for the farm