The herald., 1922-06-22

and the price paid This is a straight official let
ter.
Congressman are coming more and more to send
their quotas of seeds out. not to the voting lists
in their districts but To the school children, To
civic organizations, chambers Of commerce. banks
and factories for workmen, and great deal TO
miners.
With the department opposed to the conCresSion-
al seed distribution. and with congress habituay
for it. Oliver +. Jones originally from Cincinnati
who is i'm active charge of this work has had an
unenvable job buffer between the department
and congress for about twenty years. He prob
ably knows all the members of congress more in
timately than any other man in Washington. be-
cause he is calling upon them in their offices every
day in the year. At present he is getting more
than 2p telephone calls day from them. dictates
about 100 letters day To them, and has % or 80
of them calling on him in his office each day.
The seed distribution is conducted under the
bureau of plant industry. of which Or. William A
Taylor is chief. X. A. Oakley and j. +. w Tracy
purchase under contract all the seed that enters
into the congressional distribution and supervise
the mechanical and ply steal work of filling the
packages and mailing them Mr.. Tracy is in
charge of the seed warehouse located at 80 Penn
sylvania avenue, which is not at all modern well
ventilated or lighted This building was erected
in 1884 and was the scene of receptions, banquets
and inaugural balls for Andrew Jackson, Martin
Van Buren, and Abraham Lincoln This is not
government-owned building, but has been rented
by the department and used as Il seed warehouse
for about ten years
The filling of the orders of congressman is an
interesting part of the free-Seed distribution The
members supply their franks in sheets of ten
They cut up into single slips and counted into
bundles by expert counters from the bureau of
engraving and printing As a member sends in
an order blue slip IS made out calling upon the
seed warehouse to deliver that quantity, and this
is accompanied by the corresponding number Of
franks. The seed packages either sent to the
office of the member of congress if the franks are
not addressed. mailed out directly from
the seed warehouse if they are addressed.
These franks are now coming in at the rate of
200OW or 100000 day. Each member is entitled
TO 10000 packages of vegetable seeds and 1000
packages of flower seeds AS each of these pack
ages contains five small papers of seeds it really
means that 10000 papers of seeds are sent out
by each member of the senate and house
The way in which these seeds are first put into
the small papers and sealed and then put one each
of five different kinds into larger package and
sealed, with the members frank pasted on each
package for direct mailing is an interesting part
of the congressional distribution system. This
is done by contract, and this year contract
or is on the job, Frank Clarke Of Waco, Tex, who
has speeded up the work by devSing 4 gluing
machine.
The seed envelopes are filled by machinery
which automatically weighs the contents of each
envelope Two girls work at of these ma
chimes, filling and the other sealing the little
envelopes on a revolving belt Filling and sealing
10000 of these little envelopes is considered good
days work. The girls get pecewOrk over 10000
dfy.
Other girls sit at big tables pasting the congress
sional franks onto the container on which are
printed the names of the five varieties of vege-
tables flowers that are to be placed within. A
belt carrier runs beside huge bins into which the
small packages of seed have been dumped As
the girls finish FASTING the franks the big en-
velopes they carried. one at a time along this
travelling belt roadway and in front of a hin at
regular intervals girls, each Of whom Slips in
a small envelope. and the cOntaner proceeds to
an Inspector and then past another girl who seals
up the package by machinery.