Marketing Fruit Direct.

H. G. STREET, HEBRON, ILL.

In studying this subject, the direct marketing of fruit, let us first see how much it includes.  Does it include simply marketing alone?  Or does the success of it depend principally upon the varieties of fruit set out together with the after cultivation, pruning and spraying?  First of all you must interest people in your work by producing something that they really want, and half of your problem will then be solved.

There are any number of places in the northwest where the demand far exceeds the supply.  I do not mean for the common run of fruit full of worms and covered with scab, but, instead, strictly No. 1 fruit of the very best varieties.

About 1901, through the advice of my uncle, Dr. A. H. Street, of Albert Lea, I joined your society, and through the experience of your members I learned many valuable lessons.  Perhaps the one that impressed me the most was that of grafting our choicest varieties upon hardy crab stocks so as to make them hardy enough to withstand our hardest winters, and by so doing it nearly insures us against total failures in the fruit crop and especially against losing the trees outright.

[Illustration:  Mr. H. G. Street, of Hebron, Ills.]

This top-working of course will not do all; we still have to assist Nature by proper spraying, pruning, cultivating, etc.  Doing all in your power to secure a crop each year to supply the trade you have already worked up is a big item in holding it.

While studying your conditions, together with those of Wisconsin and Illinois, I became very much interested in the native plums as well as in the apple industry.  Therefore I also set out some three acres of the following varieties:  Surprise, Terry, Wyant, Hammer and Hawkeye, also some of the Emerald and Lombard.

As this was then new business to me, I had fallen into no deep ruts, and of course I took it for granted that all horticulturists practiced what they preached.  Therefore I pruned, sprayed, etc., according to directions, and in due time the fruits of my labor commenced to show up, and they certainly were attractive to the eye as well as to the taste.

[Illustration:  Wolf River apple tree twelve years old, bearing eighteen bushels, in H. G. Street’s orchard.]

As our supply increased our demand increased also, so that for the past five years our average plum crop has been around 2,000 baskets (the 8-lb. grape basket) and all sold readily at 25 to 35 cents retail.

We are located at Hebron, Illinois, eight miles south of Lake Geneva, Wis., on the Chicago & Lake Geneva Railway, which makes an ideal location for a fancy trade.  During plum harvest it is nothing uncommon to have fifty to 100 visitors a day.  These customers include all classes, from the Chicago millionaires to the common laborers, and all receive the same cordial reception.