Beverly banner. [volume] (Beverly, N.J.) 1877-1964, 1925-07-10

bumper crop of 1923 was sold at a price
which did not cover the cost of production II
corn growers had been organized and found that
the market would not receive their corn at what
1t cost them to produce 1t they would not have
dumped the larger part of the crop upon the mar
ket in few brief months. They would have sold
sparingly. They would have stored the remainder,
knowing full well that seasons of bountiful produc
ton always followed by seasons of low pro-
duction and that at distant day they would re-
ceive profitable price for their corn. AS 1t was,
only few of the corn farmers were able to hold
their for the higher prices which they had
rightly anticipated and which were later received
OF course, even If organized they could not
have expected to receive as much per bushel for a
3,000000,O00-bushel crop for a 2,400,000,000
bushel crop. They would doubtless have asked
somewhat smaller price, but they certainly would
have asked price-and have received (which
would have made the 3,000000,0O0 bushels of corn
worth more to them than the very next year 2,4O0-
100000 bushels of poor corn actually brought In
the market.
In other words. the corn farmers, If organized
would have adjusted the supply to the actual de-
mand. And they would have made this adjust
ment before the price became demoralzed In
fact, the adjustment was made later but only
after the great bulk of the crop had left the farm
ers' hands 1t cannot too often be stated that the
supply of any commodity which affects the price
is not the entire stock of the commodity in exist
for sale at a given price.
And so, If the dairy farmers had some way by
which they could have taken last year the incubus
of 50000,000, at the outside 100,000,000 pounds
of butter off the market, 1t is almost certain in
the opinion of experts that this depression in the
great dairy industry would not have occurred. If,
in other words, this added 5000O,O00-or, If you
please, 100000 0Apounds of butter had been
purchased at cost, say, of $50000,000 and stored
by the farmers themselves awaiting a of
less luscious grasses, the dairy farmers Of America
would have received a return upon their large
investment and their labors many million dollars
more than they actually did receive.
And so I say this report from the Department
of Agriculture discloses very perplexing facts
Now produce both corn and milk upon my farm
l feed the larger part of my corn in the form of
silage to my cows. / sell 1t, therefore in the form
of milk. 1 receive considerably less for 1t than
did year ago. And so these glowing figures of
the increased value Of the corn crop over which
the financial writer's of the great metropolitan
dailies gloat do not comfort me much. l am In
deed puzzled to know what to do. | have been
taught that to produce 60 bushels OF corn to the
acre is a finer achievement than to produce As
like to see the milk pail trimming full with sweet
pure milk. But when I see 45 bushels of corn
worth more than 60 bushels Of corn, and when
see the milk pail but two-thirds full worth more
than the trimming pail Of another year, become
confused and hardly know what to do.
Last summer the cotton crop, particularly in the
Southwest was suffering severely for lack of rain
And then one day the heavens opened and the
rains descended AS a result, the government which
before had estimated the crop at 12,4OOO00 bales.
increased the estimate to 13000,O00 bales This
was an Increase of less than per cent In the WELD
and vet, because of this estimated increase the
price declined in the market 20 per cent This
meant that the total crop of the larger estimate
was worth less In the market by $300000OOO than
the crop by the lesser estimate And vet at that
very time the world needed cotton as 1t had not
needed 1t before since the Civil war. And this
paradox was the result of timely rain
Now there Is no music sweeter to my ears than
the patter of raindrops upon the roof breaking
drought in the summer time, and yet to save nv
life cannot tell whether that rain is sweet and
fragrant bearer of bene6t-or bankruptcy When
the hot summer winds scorch the fields. do NOT
know whether to pray for rain to thank the AL
mighty for the unbroken drought.
Something is wrong with methods of mar
keting when the aggregate money value OF larger
crop of prime necessity is smaller than the value
of smaller crop. There are untold thousands of
men and women and children who need more cot
ton to clothe them than is produced in the world
today To say, therefore. that 12.400O00 bales of
cotton are worth more than 100000 bales is to
condemn system OF marketing which SO meas
ures value. s5z5 N