The Schulenburg Sticker (Schulenburg, Tex.), Vol. 13, No. 9, Ed. 1 Thursday, October 11, 1906 Page: 3 of 8
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FARMER AND PLANTER
I
■S'-
TARE IN COTTON MARKETING.
The Present System Means an Enor-
mous Loss to the Farmer.
■
: ;
of the bales and make the spinners
pay for ten or eleven pounds to the
bale for which the producer has not
been paid—'From Address of Presi-
dent E. A. Calvin to Texas Farmers'
Union.
5 -
ir' 1
There is a serious leakage in the
cotton business as at present conduct-
ed. All of our cotton that goes
abroad is sold at net weight; that is
to say, a certain arbitrary percentage
is deducted to cover the weight of
the bagging and ties, for the spinner
only wants to pay for the actual cot-
ton and not for bagging and ties,
which are worthless to him.
This is all right, provided we get
paid for the actual number of pounds
In each bale, as the price is more
when bought at net weight than at
gross weight. But abuses have crept
into the business until, under existing
conditions, we are making the buyers
a present of 8 or 10 pounds of net cot-
ton with every bale we sell them, or
about 80 cents a bale at present prices.
Why the Percentage of Tare Is Wrong
When the deduction for the bagging
and ties, or the tare, as it is called,
was fixed at 6 per cent, of the gross
weight, this was about right. Cotton
weighed about four hundred and fifty
pounds per bale, was wrapped with
close and heavy bagging with side
pieces on each side and tied with
heavy ropes. All this weighed about
twenty-seven pounds, which is exactly
6 pe** cent, of <*50 pounds, leaving 4H3
pounds of actual cotton, just wha; was
in the bale, to be paid for by the
spinner. After awhile the railroad
charges being so much per bale, re-
gardless of weight, farmers and others
saw It was to their interest to make
the bales heavy. They began to do
this until in Texas the average weight
runs considerably over 500 pounds. In
the meantime iron ties were invented,
and the bagging trust put such ex-
orbitant prices on their product that
the ginners, for self-protection, were
forced to buy the lightest and flimsiest
stuff they could get. A pattern of two-
pound bagging, such as is generally
used, and six ties, weigh 21 pounds,
instead of the 27 pounds with heavy
bagging, side pieces and rope ties as
formerly.
The Actual Figures.
Now, let us figure out the practical
working of the business to-day. Say
the farmer has hauled 1,650 pounds
of seed cotton to the gin, and that it
nets him 511 pounds of lint, to which
should be added the weight of the
bagging and ties, 21 pounds, making
the total gross weight 432 pounds.
The first thing done when this cot-
ton is invoiced to the foreign buyer
is to deduct 6 per cent., which equals
82 pounds, or 11 pounds more than
the actual tare. If the bales reached
the European spinner in this condi-
tion it would not be so bad, but they
do not. The buyer or speculator who
handles this cotton makes it his busi-
ness to see that the spinner pays for
the 511 pounds of lint cotton actually
in the bale. He does this by adding ex-
tra bagging, side pieces and old sugar
sacks until he gets the weight up to
a figure, 6 per cent, of which deducted
from the Increased gross will leave
about 511 pounds, the actual weight
of the lint cotton; and this is what
the spinner pays for, though it is 11
pounds more than the producer gets
paid for.
Two Remedies.
There are two remedies: One is to
make the bale lighter; the other to
sell cotton net weight All Egyptian
cotton is sold net weight, and they
wrap their cotton with burlap instead
of jute bagging.
The following recommendations
were made at the Washington confer-
ence:
(1) That all bales be made of stand-
ard dimensions. t
(2) That light-weight burlap or cot-
ton canvas be used for covering.
(3) That all cotton be bought and
sold net weight.
Making Bagging From Cotton.
Under the present system of de-
ducting an arbitrary percentage to
cover the weight of bagging and ties
we are forced as a matter of self-
protection to use the heaviest bag-
ging that can be obtained, and then
suffer a loss of from eight to ten
pounds per bale, while if the cotton
is sold net weight it can be covered
with cotton duck or light burlap, and
the seller would suffer no loss. An-
other thing that makes this necessary
is the jute bagging trust is gradually
advancing the price of bagging. The
time is not far distant when we will
•rect in the south a factory for con-
verting low grades of cotton into bag-
ging to be used instead of jute.
Saving Millions to Cotton Farmers.
Should the practice we advocate
become general throughout the Cot-
ton Belt it will result in a direct sav-
ing to the cotton growers of from
f8,000,000 to $10,000,000 every year;
and what is best of all, it will stop
to a large extent the practice of the
speculators who sell to Europe every
spring and summer many millions of
bales of cotton before it is made, with
very little regard to the price they
get. They do this believing that how-
ever low they sell they can put the
southern market down during the free
movements of the crop so they can
buy at profit, patch and add to weights
ENGLAND AND COTTON.
Farmers' Co-Operative Union
Of A
merica
That Country Dependent Upon United
States For Its Prosperity.
Uncle Sam holds the prosperity of
Great Britain in his hand. Few realize
the extent to which British industry
is dependent upon the cotton growers
of the United States. Practically all
the raw cotton is imported by Brit-
ish ships, the cotton exports are han-,
died by British shippers and mer-
chants, and the entire profits from the
industry are thus enhanced by many
millions. Three-fourths of England's
gross profits from cotton were derived
from the manufacturing of the Amer-
ican product. The statistics are as
significant from an American view-
point as from the English. American
shipping might profit largely from the
cotton-carrying trade, and American
manufacturers might secure all the
profits that now fall to the English.
Many far-sighted Englishmen already
appreciate the possible result of such
an awakening on the part of Ameri-
cans. They know that the loss of the
American raw product from any cause
would precipitate a period of indus-
trial depression more severe than any
recorded in the past, or possibly in
any industry. It is on this account
that every effort is made to develop
new cotton fields in the cotton belt of
the earth. It seriously is suggested
that English capital should be invest-
ed in the southern states in order to
secure land enough to raise at least
3,000,000 bales a year.
Must Spray to Have Fruit.
The inferior fruits that are coming
to the Nashville market are witnesses
that the trees have been neglected by
their owners, says a paper of that city.
Not one horticulturist in a dozen has
a sprayer, and applies bordeaux mix-
ture to destroy fungus diseases. Such
fruits are knotty, insect-bored and af-1
fected with bitter rot. If the trees
had been pruned in the fall, bark
scraped and washed with lye and soap,
the fruit would have been much larger
and would have sold for double the
price.
The usual way of improving the
fruit is by spraying the trees before
there is any sign of buds or blooms.
The bordeaux mixture prevents curl
leaf on the peach trees and apple scab
on the apples. Then the spraying is
repeated just before the blossoms ap-
pear. As soon as the blossoms have
fallen the regular course for the sum-
mer is begun. Some of the arsenites
are added to the bordeau to destroy
the curculio and all the insect and
worm enemies that injure the fruit
and prey upon the foliage. The arsen-
ites are added just as the leaves begin
to show for the canker worm. The
spraying is repeated at intervals of
from ten to fourteen days, as the
weather conditions indicate. If there
is dry weather during the month of
July there is a lay-off during that
month, and then it is taken up again
and continued to past the middle of
August. About sixty days' time is
consumed in spraying.
The beneficial effects of continuous
spraying are shown to a very marked
degree this year, as the trees remain
thrifty, perfect in foliage, with the
leaves in proper color and fruit is not
wormy. There should be an organiza
tion of fruit growers in each county,
so as to unite their efforts In spray
ing, helping each other and shipping
in bulk. United efforts are of marked
advantage to the horticulturist.
As a New York Paper Sees it
Neglect of small Industries in the
south is at last beginning to arouse
the attention of farmers and the
press. The Raleigh (N. C.) Progres-
sive Farmer recently printed a letter
from an expert who protests against
the habit of ignoring everything but
cotton. It is "King Cotton" over
agaiol, in a fresh sense. True, new
industries like mining, timbering, cot
ton manufacture, and the making of
turpentine and rosin are steadily be-
ing expanded, but these involve large
amounts of capital. The Incidental op-
portunities of the man with an acre
or two, who raises a few bales of cot
ton, are sadly neglected. Bee-culture,
raising of silk worms, hay growing,
and the production of seeds for north-
ern markets, the keeping of goats, the
culture of pecan nuts—these are some
of the valuable small industries to
which the Progressive Farmer's ex-
pert calls attention. Moreover, near
Raleigh he finds valuable water power
going to waste, to say nothing of the
folly of taking no advantage of the
hard woods—white oak, hickory and
dogwood, with which the neighbor
hood is enriched without being aware
of it. There are fields in sight of
Raleigh, and we might add, of about
every other southern city, which have
not been in cultivation for the last
twenty-five years, and yet would make
excellent truck farms. One trouble Is
of course, the laziness and indifference
of the poor whites, with the uncertain
labor of the blacks. Time and educa-
tion are the remedies.—N. Y. Evening
Post.
The recent spurt in the price of cot-
ton should be taken as a serious les-
son by all cotton raisers. For some
time both the Union and the Cotton
Raisers' Associations have been doing
all they could to boost the price of
cotton to a reasonable figure, but all
their combined efforts have not done
in many weeks what a small disaster
to the crop has done in two days.
This matter should not pass without
full analysis of t.he cause and effect
of the occurrence. There was noth-
ing in the world in the raise except
an apparent shortage of cotton as com-
pared with the previous estimates. It
is very vivid in the minds of all the
farmers how strong an effort was
made three years ago to curtail the
crop, and with a considerable degree
of success. Then the boll weevil came
along and helped the reduction out
considerably, and all together the price
climbed righi up to a money-making
stage. Following this there was a
break for "the big crop" and we pretty
nearly got it in spite of the fact that
nature did all she could to hold it
back, and down went the price. It
seems that the lesson to be learned is
that there is a good price for a right-
sized crop and a poor price for too
much cotton. The good purpose of the
warehouse is to maintain prices, but
as long as water runs down hill the
warehouse will not make a high price
for a bjimper crop, and all the talk
this side of the river of death will
not avail to make it otherwise. All
over the West, and it is a territory
almost unbounded, new land has been
put into cotton. There has been
enough land in the Panhandle of Tex-
as and in the Territories put into ept-
ton within the last two years to cut
the market all to pieces, even with
the boll weevil and the boll worm tug-
ging all the South Texas crop. Now,
isn't if a piece of common sense to
get busy right now consulting about
next year's crop? When we have the
fact staring us in the face that ten
millions bales of cotton will actually
bring more money than twelve mil-
lions bales, it seems that it would not
take a philosopher to know what ought
to be done, and knowing it, get busy
doing it in time to make the effort
count for dollars and cents. In this
case there is no time to lose. Will
there be a response to this call for
common-sense action in an emergen-
cy? DIVERSIFY!
FARM AND PLANTATION NOTES.
—Georgia's first bale of new cotton
was marketed in Albany, July 31, by
Deal Jackson, a negro farmer living
in Dougherty county. He marketed
the first bales last year.
—At the recent annual meeting of
the Southern Nurserymen's associa-
tion, held at Lookout Inn, near Chat-
tanooga, a resolution was Introduced
and passed condemning the free dis-
tribution of freed seeds by the gov-
ernment
Cowpea Hay.
The value of the cowpea for hay Is
being more widely recognized each
year, and the acreage is being con
stantly increased. One who has never
fed it will be surprised to see how
much he can save on his grain bill
by having a good supply of pea hay
This is true in feeding all kinds of
stock; but especially so of milk cows
Of course one can not make cowpeas
entirely take the place of bran and
cottonseed meal, but he can certainlj
do so to a large extent.
The rapidity with which the Union
is spreading all over the Northern
States is surpassing its unmatched
race over the South. You can hardly
pick up a paper that is not full of the
news of new Unions springing up all
over the country. The principles
which underlie the Farmers' Union
are broad enough to cover the toilers
in the soil of every section of our
country.
You fellow that has his wood to
haul up for the winter, isn't it a little
late for you to be hanging around wait-
ting till your tail freezes nearly off
before you move out and pull that
wood in? Two months ago—long be-
fore cotton got ready for picking, you
had plenty of time, and the roads were
in fair condition for this work.
How are you fixed up for protecting
the horses and cattle from the cold
fall rains and the fierce winds that
sometimes come down on the South-
land, making us feel as if the North
pole had got dislocated and swung
round to our back lot? You are keep-
ing these animals as prisoners, and if
you mistreat them, you are a miser-
able low-down sinner without any ex-
cuse for your cussedness. Get busy
and fix up for your slave-prisoners so
that you can class up with decent and
Christian people.
Have you been reading about how
the "split log drag" makes good roads?
Well, you ought to read up on this
matter. You ought to have some pride
in the sort of a road leading by your
place, and then you sometimes want
to use the road yourself. Think it
over, and if you have any obligation to
yourself, your family, your neighbors
and your country, get you a split log
drag and get as busy as a cranberry
merchant. It will pay you immensely.
This drag has had a thorough trial in
all sorts of soil, including the black
waxy of Texas, and it has done the
business every time. Look it up and
get busy.
It is getting about the time of the
year to read every day about some
good honest farmer's house burning
up from the defective flue disease.
How are your flues?
Just have to tell you to go out to
the next meeting and carry something
to tell 'em. Make the meeting just
a little better than any you have ever
attended. That is the way to keep
the blues off the farm in the winter.
Have a rattling good time at the meet-
ing, and between meetings have a good
time getting ready for the next meet-
ing. Oh! that meeting as a tonic
for a slow liver is a crackerjack.
FARMERS' JOURNAL JOTTINGS.
In some rural neighborhoods it is
almost necessary to go outside the
ranks of the fanners to find a man
with sufficient literary ability to lead
out in any reform move. The all-cot-
ton idea of farming is responsible for
this condition. The farmers in their
childhood days were in the cotton
patch when they should have been in
school, and this autumn day their chil-
dren are bent over the rows picking
cotton while the children of other
classes are bent over their tablets.
The Journal has no interest in a
farmers' organization any further than
that organization tends to conserve
the interest of the farmers. It's the
farmers we're concerned about—not
the organization.
The farmers have the speculators
and the trust magnates at their mercy,
but the majority of them do not know
it.
When a political party exists for
its own sake and not for the country's
sake, that party has no right to exist
at all.
Through co-operation the people will
gain industrial liberty, and then will
they be truly free and independent
The trusts will continue to grow in
number and power until the middle
class Is practically extinguished, un-
less we, too, combine.
The Farmers' onion will save the
most of competition among the farm-
ers by destroying competition. It
means maximum production at mini-
mum cost.
While you have some money go to
the local editor and pay him for his
paper, and tell him that he is getting
out a pretty good paper, but that he
will have to "clip it swift" to keep up
with the procession, as this is a day
of progress, and the people are ex-
pecting him to take the lead as the
banner bearer. Then, while you are
about it send a copy or two of the
paper to your old friends "back in the
States." And tell the editor that you
are mighty particular about what you
send .the people back there, and if he
fails to get out a single good issue,
not to send that one that is weak.
MERCURY'S MUSINGS.
With a great network of Union cot-
ton warehouses throughout the South
holding millions of bales of cotton to
be sold gradually from month, to
month, as required by the spinner at
a fair, uniform price, or rather, grad-
ually advancing scale of prices, so ad-'
justed as to fully offset the expense
of holding, the spinner will have no
further occasion nor inclination to pa-
tronize the speculators.
The calamity howljfr seems to have
turned his job over to the muck raker.
The beginning of the end of com-
petition appeared with the formation
of the first trust, which was capital
combined to save itself from competi-
tion. This meant that competition
amongst capitalists, was ended. It
means that in order to live and pros-
per, we farmers must combine and co-
operate.
Men are haunted by two ghosts—
poverty in this world, and punishment
in the next. Justice in industry, and
truth in religion, will send both these
ghosts back to their graves.
When we farmers want to be pros-
perous and happy—want it bad enough
to unite and work for it, and think
for it, we can have it, and not till
then. We have been ground up long
enough, and hard enough, in the mil)
of poverty and suffering.
More business and less hot air Is
what the Union needs all along the
line. So please expend your surplus
energy In shoving the business feature
oi the Farmers' Union.
Brother Kelly of Voss Local writes
that the membership in his section are
determined to use their cotton seed
for fertilizing purposes, if they don't
get $15 per ton for them. This is a
good resolve. They will more than
pay that much, used as a fertilizer.
The trouble with our people generally
is that too much land is planted and
half worked, and poorly fertilized. We
shouio study how to make the land
more productive and till well what is
planted.—Mercury-Password.
A BRACE OF TORNADOES.
New Orleans Region the Center of Cy-
clonis Disturbances—Six Killed.
New Orleans, La., Oct. 6.—This re-
gion wajs today the center of cyclonle
disturbances, at least three of wthich
were tornadoes, and caused the loss of
six lives, with nine persons fatally in-
jured. About daylight heavy storms
broke throughout the country for 100
miles west, north and east of this city.
Reports last night state that the crops
and mills were destroyed. The dam-
age, including that done in New Or-
leans, is placed at $1,000,000.
The worst of .the tornadoes was
north of New Orleans, where between
5:30 and 7 o'clock in 'the morning it de-
vastated portions of three parishes.
New Orleans was visited by anether
tornado and a third passed northward
of Biloxi, on the Gulf coast.
The first tornado struck West Baton
Rouge parish about 6 o'clock, killing
Mrs. T. Foret and her daughter, Mrs.
White. Mirs. Foret's body was found
in a field near her demolished house.
Two children at Mrs. Foret's house
were fatally injured in the collapse of
a sugar refinery on the St Delphine
plantation. The city of Baton Rouge
was slightly damaged. In St. James
parish one woman whose name has not
(been learned was killed, wihilo Mrs.
H. R. Webber and daughter and Mrs.
John Meyer and also a negro were fa-
tally injured. Fifteen buildings were
blown completely down in this perish.
WHISKY AND WEEVILS.
Dr. Hunter Says It Is Foolish, and that
Alcohol Is Too Expensive.
New Orleans, La, Oct. 8.—Dr. W. B.
Hunter, United States Entomologist, in
charge of the iboll weevil campaign
in Texas, before leaving for Dallas
with Dr. L. O. Howard, made the fol-
lowing interesting statement:
"The use of whiskey for the exter-
mination of the boll weevil, of which
mention has lately been made, is ab-
solutely foolish, although alcohol, like
numerous other things, will destroy
the weevil. It Is not practicable, be-
cause there are any number of cheap-
er things that are just as effective.
What the department is in search of
is not an exterminating agent, because
we believe it impossible. We want
something which will enable the far-
mer to raise a crop of cotton in spite
of the ravages of .the weevil. We de-
sire to control the situation rathe*
than kill the bug."
JESSUP, GA., BURNING.
FROM FARMERS' UNION MAGA-
ZINE.
By keeping the market hungry, the
cotton growers of the South will take
a long stride toward commercial
emancipation.
All that is necessary In order to
command a profitable price for this
staple crop, this universal necessity—
cotton—is for the cotton growers to
stand firm for their rights, stand firm
for their price. The market will re-
spond in a little while
CULTIVATION THE SOLUTION.
This Is Best Means of Avoiding the
Cotton Pest.
Wharton, Tex.: Mr. Ford, one of
Louisiana's oldest and most experi-
enced cotton raisers, and who resided
in Wharton county twelve months just
after the war closed, or in 1866, has
been here several days studying the
boll weevil, he having been sent to this
country by the representative citizens
of his community to ascertain some
means of destroying the weevil, or to
learn how the people here avoided the
cotton pest as much as possible. His
investigation so far has met with no
success, and aibout the only informa-
tion he has secured is to cultivate his
crop. It has been demonstrated here
that thorough and continuous cultiva-
tion is the only practicable remedy for
the weevil.
FOUR PEOPLE KILLED.
Disastrous Fusillade Following Quarrel
by Seguin Negroes.
Seguin, Tex.: At 11 o'clock last
night just at the conclusion of .the Nor-
ris circus show a general fusillade
woke uip the northwestern part of the
city. Mrs. Otto Arnold, wife of a city
Alderman, walking home from the
show with her husband, was wounded
with a shot in the shoulderblade. A
Mexican boy was shot in the calf of
the leg; a negro woman was shot in
the right shoulder, and Taylor MaJone,
colored, got about fifty No. 4 shot in
te back and is desperately wounded.
The assailant who did this indiscrim-
inate volleying is a negro named Earl
Allen. He was not caught last night,
but gave himself up to the sheriff this
morning. The cause of the trouble was
a quarrel between him and Malone.
No Means of Fighting the Fire, Which
Has Already Consumed Blocks.
Jessup, Ga.: A destructive fire is
raging in Jessup. It has destroyed
the Strickland Hotel, where it started,
two stores, the postoffice and is
spreading rapidly.
The building in which the telephone
exchange is located is on fire as this
message, giving the information of the
fire, is telephoned. It is sure to be de-
stroyed and this is the last message
that will leave the town.
There are no means of fighting the
ames, which are sweeping on in their
work of destruction.
Pay or Resign.
San Antonio, Tex.: A few weeks
ago the (police and fire commission
of this city passed a resolution to the
effect that All men employed in each
department must pay their debt& or
resign. It has been learned by the
commission that some men have dis-
obeyed this order. A1 merchants who
claim that bills are unpaid will be
asked to come before the commission,
and if the policemen have been negli-
gent in the payment they will be dis-
charged from the force. This applied
to all bills except for liquor and other
items that may be classed as extrava>
gant.
Mexican Woman Stabbed.
San Antonio, Tex.: Last night at
Converse, Tex., a Mexican woman,
Narcisso Gcmez, was murderously as-
saulted. She was coming out of a
store with a .pocket book in her hand.
A man demanded that she give up the
purse. She refused, and he grabbed
the purse, striking at her with a knife,
inflicting a very dangerous wound just \
over the heart As she turned to run
she was struck in the back with the
knife, the weapon remaining in the
wound. Her assailant escaped.
School Fund $600,000.
Austin, Tex.: Although the state
board of education recently purchased
$454,000 of state of Texas bonds for
the permanent school fund the fun has
increased within the past week or two
until it is again above half a million
dollars, and, in fact, is approximately
$600,000.
Pawed to Death.
Willis, Tex.: Sid McKinney, a
young unmarried man, 26 years old,
living about seven miles from here, at
Richard's mill, died last night from
wounds received from a mad mule dur-
ing yesterday sometime.
While he was dressing a sore on the
mule's shoulder, the animal pawed him
down and mortally wounded him.
Moulton, Tex.: A slow rain began
falling here Thursday morning and
continued until night We now have
a very good season for fall gardens.
Postoffices Discontinued.
Washington: The following Texas
postoffices have ben ordered discon-
tinued: Bonanza, Hopkins county;
Gray, Eastland county; Groveland,
Jack county; Lemit, Shelby county;
Dillon, Penn and Posey, Hopkins coun.
ty.
Advised to Dissolve Union.
Lake Charles, La.: At a meeting last
night of the Lake Charles Mill Work-
ers' Union the president of the union,
James Shevalier, advised the members
to dissolve the union, and apply for
work at the mills as individuals. For-
mal action was not taken on the re-
commendation. It is understood that
the mills will resume oiperations to-
day if crews can be mustered who are
not affiliated with the union.
Wanted in Coryell.
Dodge, Tex.: A man by the name
of Kirk, wanted in Coryell county on
a charge of criminal assault was ar-
rested here Saturday by deputy sher-
iffs and is being held pending the ar-
rival of officers from there.
Gonzales: Houston & Booth shipped
a carload of hogs to Fort Worth Wed-
nesday.
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Winfree, Raymond. The Schulenburg Sticker (Schulenburg, Tex.), Vol. 13, No. 9, Ed. 1 Thursday, October 11, 1906, newspaper, October 11, 1906; Schulenburg, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth189218/m1/3/: accessed April 30, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Schulenburg Public Library.