White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1927-04-01

b. Seville, treasurer, and M. Manner
itch to complete the board.
Negotiations were at once started
for the purchase of the local cream
cry, and on December 27th the deal
was completed and Mr. Agen retired
from the field turning over to the
Enumclaw Cooperative Creamery
Company his equipment for a pur-
chase price of $725.OO.
Earl Kent, who had served his ap-
premiership under Mr.. Cheal, and
who had continued with the enter
prize through the Agen ownership,
was retained as buttermaker, a posi-
ton he continued to hold for a num-
Der of years.
Thinking in small figures in those
in Washington, the Enumclaw Co.
operative Creamery Company was in
corporated for but $1,000 divided into
750 shares of capital stock at a par
value of $500 share. These shares
were sold to patron members, each
patron being required to purchase one
share for each COW from which he was
furnishing milk to the creamery. The
original $50 shares still represent the
entire capitalization of the creamery
company; and from this small founda-
ton has grown the splendid $4,000
plant; but the stock has been re-dis-
tributed among the $50 stockholders,
so is no longer held on the cow-owner-
ship basis, for it now takes thousands
of cows to supply the milk furnished
by the 700 patrons, nearly half of
which have no financial interest in
the creamery company.
/! Certainly the Enumclaw Co-opera.
tive Creamery Company may we'll be
considered the pioneer cooperative
dairy organization of the state, for ii
has Stuck and from the very first
day to the present time has continued
to grow and prosper, until the splen-
didly equipped plant that now oper-
ates under a force of a dozen or more
efficient employees, represents well an
investment of $4,000, and is turning
out annually the very best of dairy
products worth all but million dol
lars. But in spite of the growth and
prosperity of the association it's wealth
is represented now as it was in the
start, by only the original $50 shares
at $500 EACH on which the holder re-
ceives an annual dividend of per cent
stock; and while each share of the
stock now has an actual investment
value back of it exceeding $4,000
with the association it is only recog
nized at par and on it's face value
draws it's interest. These stock GER
tificates are considered by their own
ers more as a certificate of member
ship than as evidence of property
ownership. Here is one issue of stock
dL lCdoI, vi WllISl llO utLOLlpC hao OSSAi
made to increase it's bulk by watering
The system of buying milk and
cream is on butterfat basis, prices
being gagged by the quality of the
milk or cream delivered by the farm
er, so Enumclaw may be considered
also as the pioneer creamery in Wash
ington buying on a cream grading
system, for this is what the practice
really amounts to.
Enumclaw's trade is largely fol
sweet cream and milk and prices for
both are figured on butterfat bases, SO
should sample of cream show more
than Is acid test a cut of one cent is
made in the pride paid the producer
Fresh milk is bought on the same but
terfat base, but an additional 35 cents
is allowed per hundred for the skim
milk when the bacteria count does not
exceed 10000 per cubic centimeter;
so cents when the count is under 25,.