Evening Star Newspaper, November 4, 1923, Page 75

Shenandoah’s Apple Becomes Annually More I | ; Region—One Grower Devotes M Trees. BY 0. M. KILE. HERE may be -more romance and poetry in “apple blossom” time, but the business end of the season—the season that pays the bills and fills the pantry shelves—is “apple harvest” time. Few realize that less than 100 miles from Washington lies one of the big- west gDDle-vroduclng sections: of the United States. The Blue Ridge apple region is rapidly becoming. a for- , Inidable rival of the famous Hood river and Wenatchee apple sections of the west. There seems every rea- on to believe that the day is not far distant when high frelght rates and the initiative and enterprise of the Blue Ridge apple people will practi- cally drive the far western apple from ', the seaboard markets. A single shipping-point in the upper ‘Shenandoah valley—Inwood, W, Va.— will send out this year In the neigh- borhood of 200,000 barrels of apples. That is a thousand carloads—twenty- five trains of forty. cars each. Mar- tinsburg, Winchester, Shepherdstown, Hancock and Keyser are other im- portant apple shipping points. In all something like a millioy and a quar- ter barrels of this fruit will go out from the upper Shenandoah valley | 'and nearby ranges this year. Apple harvest time is, of cours ’ . which s’ in apples. He has nearly 30,000 trees. Let us follow Mr. Sllver around for a day and see what the apple-harvest season means to him.. He is up at daylight and has his chores done, so that by the time breakfast {s over and the pickers ar- rive—some of them camp in the or- cards—he is ready to superintend the day’'s actlvities. Firet he learns that one of his truck drivers has been in a smash-up the evening before, and the truck must undergo repairs before it can haul any more apples to the packing house or shipping station. Next the foreman at one of his out- lying orchards calls to inform him that he is nearly out of barrels, and will have to stop picking unless more barrels are on hand soon. Another foreman is short ‘of help. A. third foreman wants: to know what to do with the fallen apples, since the locad, | apple-canning ‘plant has temporarily exhausted its storage space. The manager of the co-operative apple- Packing plant, of which Mr. Silver-is president, wants to know when to start ehipping tHe new package they | have worked out. | Questions of increasing wages, | shifting picking crews from one va- riety to another, repairing machinery nd keeping all operations on . the move, o as to co-ordinate smoothly, APPLE H.ARVFST‘ TIME.IN VIRGINIA. THOUSANDS OF ACRES AR ARE EMPLOYED e ———————— geason of great activity in'the orchard mections. Perhaps one, two or evem three years have goné by without a crop. Late frosts may have blasted all hope of returns in those years, I yet expenses went on and piled up a heavy burden of debt. Under such conditions discouragement tugs at even the stoutest hearts. Then come: a good crop, such as the crop of the | esent year. The growers see a chance to pay off old debts and have 2 nice margin left to bank. But the crop must be safely harvested and sbld before the returns can be defi- nitely tagged and-added to the bank account. And there are so many slips "twixt the orchard and the bank. A rainy season at picking time may cause the apples to fall to the ground and cut the profits in half. A single windy day may do the same, The pickers may go on strike, the packing plants may break down, or, worst of all, the bottom may drop out of the market and make the crop not worth picking. This last hap- pened two years ago, when thousands of tons of apples were left to rot on “.the ground. Oh, yes,"vou and I went right on paying b cents apiece for what we bought at the fruit stands. * ok k% 5 ND wonder, then, that apple-picking season is an anxious and fever- ish time for the orchard owner. Gray Silver, well known in legislative cir- cles In connection with the farm bloe, i8 one of the biggest orchard men in Athe Shenandoah eection. He owns in 811 1,100 acres of land, over.half of s ONE OF THE APPLE SORTING AND PACKING THE VIRCINIA PAGKING ES: THE VARI " 77" ARE MECHANICALLY SORTED, DROPPING /INTO nmmnommg’:gm o keep Mr. Silver -on the jufnp-all day | long. - His-trusty fiivver fiits from one | orchard to another—some’of them are |a good many miles apart—stops at the packing house and shipping sta- tion awhile and then on again to.an- other point, keeping in constant tele- | phone reach all the time: When everything is working smooth- y Mr. Silver's various trucks will haul thirty loads of ‘apples’ a day, | each 1oad averaging™: fifty ‘bushels. The picking season lasts about two months. Formerly each grower' packed his own apples on his own farm. This is still done in many sectlons, but at several points the apples are merely hauled in in rough boxes and ‘are then graded and packed at the central plant by machinery. One of the most interesting of these plants ls. at Inwood, eight miles south of Martinsburg, W. Va. This | packing plant is owned by the state, and is in the charge of. H. W. Pretty- man, a representative. of the agricul- tural extension department of West Virginia University. Its function is twofold—first, to train apple packers |and plant managers, and, second; to serve as a demonstration of the ad- vantage of this method of -handling apples over the old-style home-pack- Ing eystem. Mr. Silver was instrumental in get- ting the necessary appropriation from the state for this purpose, and -is president of the co-operative gfoup of apple growers who furnish: the apples used in carrying ‘on .this practical demonstration. It {s conducted on a strictly business basis and furnishes a MACHINES USED. IN highly deairable means of preparing apples for market. Some growers haul their apples eight. to ten miles to get to this plant. . * ® K ¥ HE co-operative assoclation, to- gether with its branches in various parts of the Shenandoah sec- tion, has adopted a brand and label— the Johnie- Appleseed Brand—and 1is | preparing to advertise 'in much the | western fashion. All sales of fruit | are handled through the nation-wide | co-operative. sales agency—the Fed- erated Fruit Growers. Many of these apples come into the Washington and | Baltimore markets, but.they also. go |as far west as Cleveland, -south to Nashville, and to the east there is'no limit. Large ‘quantities go into the export trade.via New York and Bos- ton. At Inwood is located, also, the big- gest. apple by-products plant in the world. Only the best apples go Into barrels, boxes, baskets and cartons. The blemished, undersized and fallen fruits go to the by-products.plant. Here long rows. of automatic ma- chinery peel and core apples day after day. These are worked up into canned apples for ples, apple butter, jelltes, | ete. Large quantities are also used | to make cider and vinegar. This by- m farvest T'ime Single Shipping’ Point in Ufifie} Vafl:g.( Thss Ymvzr’Seiufa‘Out 200.000I'Barre7:. Representing .a Thousand Carloads—Total of Mr’”r'on_av:d a Quarter Barrels Expected to Go Out From T’gfa ore Than"Ha’f_:o'fAI;IOO Acres to Apples and Has Nearly 30,000 amount of the purchase price 2s agreed upon and the rallroad must stand the damages. The federal in- spector’s . certificate sajd the ship- ment was in good condition when turned over to the rallway company. It is up to the railroad after that. One Tesult of the inauguration of this system has been more prompt deliv- ery of fruit shipments. * % % *x NE of the most troublesome fea- tures of the apple game is the s curing and handling of the pickers. Numerous persons in Washington and Baltimore have adopted the practice of going out ta the orchards to pick apples for a month or 8o each fall. A dozen or more employes of the United States Department of Agriculture have - been -doing this for several years. They get an outing in a de- lighttul region and make good money at the same time. .But the number of pickers required is so large that every resource is exhausted apd still there is always a shortage of pickers. Trucks scour the surrounding country and bring in workers from the farms and villages. Every man, woman and child among the orchard ' famill themselves s pressed into servic They work in groups and can gener- ally be located among the trees by E COVERED WITH -TREES, . AND THOUSANDS OF MEN AND WOMEN IN. THE PICKING. products ‘plant makes it worth' while to harvest large quantities of fruit that formerly went to waste or was sold at very 16w prices for cider pur- poses. This is an excellent example ods to agriculture, and it is adding wealth of that region annually. Another. interesting- development in the fruit business was early tried out at Inwood. This is what is known as federal inspection at point of origin. -Until within the last two or three years fruit was shipped sub- ject to. inspeection at destination. This has always been a great source of trouble and loss to the shipper. Sometimes unscrupulous dealers would' report that the frult was not up to the grade represented or that 1t had arrivéd in bad condition. This always meantl oss to the shipper. Under the new system federal in- spectars are located right at .the packing plant and keep an eye on all apples packed. They carefully in- spect six_or seven random barrels 28 each_car is loaded. The Inspector then certifies as to-the grade; quality and condition of this carload of fruit. The car is then ‘sealed and turned over to the railroad compapy. When | it ‘arrives at its destination: there can be no argument. as to- the grade. M the condition is- bad—aa, for -in- stance,- i the shipment has been de- layed -and the fruit- has-begun -to spofl—the receiver .must collect -his damages from the.rallroad -.company. The_shipper-has nothing to-do with it. “The receiver must . \ of the application of efficiency meth- | many thousands of dollars to the| the sounds of laughter and song. Usu- ally they are a jolly lot and make the | picking season something of a lark— | a time to make some extra money for | clothes and for Christmas. Strikes are not uncommon, though, |among the men who make apple-pick- ing a serious' business. The tempta- tion to hold up a grower is some- times too great to resist. he simply must have pickers. A good picker can take off fifty barrels of ap- ples a day when they hang thick and are of good size.’ THe usual price for picking is 20 cents per barrel, al- though it has been thirty. The ordi- nary man, working by the day, how- ever, usually does not take off more than thirty barrels of apples. It would seem that with so many different kinds of labor at work, payment by the barrel would be the general rule. But the trouble is that so many pick- ers “by the barrel” have the unpleas- ant habit of skipping the scattered apples in the top of the trée, or even of shaking the fruit and picking it up Off, of the.ground when the foreman is not looking. Every man you meet around Mar- tinsburg seems to he’ Interested in ap- ples. - You are likely. to-find ‘the office of the lawyer and ‘the ynsurance man closed up when you call-during apple- picking time. They are out-supervi ing the - harvesting of their-: crops. ‘Large numbers of new- orchards- are due to come into bearing in'the mext few years, and the importance of the Shenandoah and contiguous territory as an apple ‘reglon seems -likely. to grow rapldly. They know | ~ [There Is Only .One Paris Boulevard, , portant] Known as Main Street of the Worl Almost Everybody That Is Wortk Looking at Is Sure to Pass if You Wait Long Enough—Non- descripts Mingle With the Successful People-of the World—This Year 120,000 Americans Were Among.the Visitors—Numerous Confidence Victims Found Among Clear-Headed Tourists—News Center of France. : BY STERLING HEILIG. PARIS, October 25. HERE is one place where Paris centers, where the rays of light all- meet, where life is brilliant-for each person, where the comfortable- joy of 'living concen- trates, and you are smeared with it. 1t s the boulevard — ‘“the” boule- vard—g crescent of broad, shady, streets, continuous, in mid-Paris, and lined with cafes, theaters, hotels and bright shops. But these things do not miake “the’ boulevard; for there are quantities of other boulevards in Paris, broad and shady, avenues with all ‘the scenery. They are mot it in the slightest. This ‘year, 120,000 Americans did the Paris boulevard. That iy to say, they sat on its open sidewalks, at 11,000 little tables, on 32,785 little chairs, to watch the easy-going, well- dressed multitude stroll by. Half of these Americans will tell you that they sat in the center of the world. The saying got about from Richard Harding Davis' that the exact spot is beneath the letter “I” of “Cafe de la Paix,” -on the awning of that famous sidewalk ¥terrace” at the corner.of the Place de I'Opera. t is true, in this sense—if you =it there long enough, almost everybody in the world worth looking at is liable to pa: There s no crowd like this on earth—and no such place to watch it Illustrious statésmen, glorious soldiers, members of great' famille renowned financiers and - Industrial magnates rub shoulders, incognito, with elegant loafers. Famous beau- ties of every capital, great actresses and singers, society leaders whose faces are vaguely familiar in the fl\m e L4, i 4 MR newspapers, fiit past, recognised and unrecogniser, | among shopgirls and nondescripts. ¥ Swindiers who have got away with millions; exotic.politiclans who have broaght the. home . treasury with them; and great criminals;. &ven,. who have made rich hauls are drawn ir- resistably- to - the . Paris boulevard. Equally so are men who Mave bullt greut ‘railways, irrigation dams and sea_ walls—"the frock-coated Ameri- fca and on the blistered sheep ranges of-Australia men make dates to meet upon the Paris boulevard. Indian rajalls and Armenian. money-lenders scheme to make the visit. Dusky can kings, watching the southern t, dream of it! -The Paris boule. is- the meeting place for the suc- of all the world! fact did not make the boule- ' g i to. the town. is BT '§EEE I i discovery | 3 =] | Al ) \w'\')_,“ == AL 14 P )"//_ ~NIGHT JN“THE BOULEVARD CAFE OF PARIS. upon_the sidewalk, tilted back, to ad- mire, condemn, discriminae and pass| on all the citizens and.strangers going by, because *they know their word completely. The very village loafers, at their favorite corner, are more truly Parislan than the vague sports of our great citles, cramped and isolated in the night reeorts which are in- variably separated by water-tight compartments. Not so, cut off in “ex- | clusive” pleasure-haunts, do you keep in touch with all that happens in your sphere? To keep in touch with all that bappens, day by day, in Parls, is—or was—the pleasure of the boulevard. Something of it remains. To sit and stroll and talk and talk 2nd talk is still the true mark of this street of streets! To .sit, on the open sidewalk, at 11,660 little tables, is of the essence of it. Certainly, it induces to Im- prommptu comversations with un- known, but agreeable parties, who have been left $50,000 to distribute among the poor of American cities by their uncle's will. How usually cau- tious men fall so easily for the old confidence game in Paris was former= 1y explained by the insidious mauve and green drinks of the boulevard. | Since the war, absinthe has been| barred, the Amer-Picon has lost its superkick, and “for the princess,” | loaded with cocaline, is but a memory, ST DAY the'drinks are pink, yellow, le gre¢n and glinting milky- white; | but, as previously, they are all long , drinks—to make them last the longer, so that you can do more sitting and talking. Yet, there Were never 0 many confidence vic- bution to the universal conversation. Talk, talk, all around you! “If the English get control of the French-Belglan Sleeping-Car Com- pany’s voting stock- S “Those Americans have taken the Acacias and call it Rector-Club—" “But there is mo contraband from Switzerland! French customs ex- aminers have stopped opening your trunks, except now and then, for looks. Everything s - cheaper In France!" An old man passes, gay and shabby, with a pin xed in one end of a bam- boo stick—to harpoon clgar and clg- arette stumps. He transfers them to his pocket. “That’s De Vries!" exclaims your neighbor to his table companions. “He used to be worth millions!"” * * % % MONG the nondescripts of the boulevard are broken-down no- bles, ruined speculators, unfrocked priests, dishonored soldiers and way- ward sons, the debris of the past. They will not quit the boulevard! T've seen a sandwich-man called to a cafe terrace and asked to sit down, with honor, by some old acquaintance. Only on the boulevard couldssuch a | thing happen. Another time, I heard two ragged old fellows talking. “It was the year we made the cop- per pool” said he of the wild whiskers. in the Champs-Elysees.” “I remember,” said the bald one. “It was the same year you got me voted in at the Rue Royale.” - Now, the “Rue Royale” is one of the five aristocratic clubs of Paris. Only on the boulevard can men who once knew the great glittering pub- “1 gave Amelia her house | without a single square; yet, never- theless, it is the palpitating heart of Paris! Sk K K % T IS the press that does it. Along the side streets, scarcely one block from the boulevard, all the great dally papers-of Paris and foreign countries have their offices. What Paris will know tomorrow the boule- vard knows today. What papers may not print the boulevard discusses. The boulevard is the public opinion of France—and often of the world. Even the tourist feels i{t. Toned down to whatever receptivity is his, he feels an echo of that mighty thrill. He participates in a vast col- lective consciousness—by feeling, if not by understanding. Because here the telegraph and cable compete by word of mouth. Here are the for- eigners—the passing world at large, selected by success, and naturally falling Into the boulevard as the main street, the public place! ‘Which brings us back to the 14,670 little tables and 67,543 little chairs on the sidewalk! Folks will sit out, even in late autumn and midwinter! Yet inside the cafes are equally crowded. They are boulevard cafes. all much alike. They are, so to speak, continuous! In and out the houlevard cafes it is all one continuous place, including sidewalk and the promenade. There are no water-tight compartments. Clubs, teas and bars are water-tight compartments. All over the rest of Paris the cafes are water-tight compartments. Each has its local public dominating, and the passing stranger, who has mno touch with the local public. Only on “THE HOUR OF THE GIDDY MULTITUDE. IN WINTER IT IS 3 IN THE AFTERNOON; IN SUMMER, 10 P.M.” tims among clear-header tourists as |lic life of Paris still mix in it, with-|the boulevard is this collective con- this past summer! *“Why could we not sit outdoors, on the sidewalk like this, at home?” is sure to come up in the amateur Boulevardier's conversation, “It Is great!” “That man, out there, has dropped his pocketbook!” observés the casual companion. When they rescue it, and the man proves his ownership by naming its rich contents, they may have a glass of ‘soda with canary |colored syrup’ in it. “Flavor of sweet plums!” says the victim; but he not due to drink, but to crave conver- sation in the open alr, upon the Paris Boulevard! Here, talk was invented. “Dissipated!” remarks Charley's aunt, In view of the yellow- drink. “Ripping!” ~murmurs Charley's schoolboy - brother, slipping a French dollar-bill to & Passing fakir who ‘whispers “transparent cards!” “Drop itr" whispers Charley, and he " Charley ‘knows the bought transparent cards 1ast summer, ahd they are “Spik Ing-leesh! Vill you se burd?” No answer. 3 frauds. “I spik Ing-lessh! “Oh, Charley, is. it true? little bird! How much?* ‘The splendid blonde has spoken, the girl of milk and roses; and fif- teen men, around about, take interest in the dopy love-bird on a stick, so full of drug-sosked seed that ft just < clings, ‘That bird is sick! Il taken up for cruelty to oontinues Charley’s contrt- 74 Zee burd al-sol” Such & out money and without price! What is this magic place? Is the boulevard the brain ot Paris? No, the intellectual city is away off, across the river, in the university quarter and among the publishers of the Boulevard St. Germain. Its in- habitants are complete strangers to the boulevard—except to take a day off! Is the boulevard the center of Pa- rislan tramo? No, the places of the Chatelet and the Republique must always remain this, by resson of the markets, the rallway stations and the production quarters. Heavy traffic is actually barred from the boulevard! Is the boulevard the cenmter of fashion? No, wealth and fashion have their centers far west. Is the boulevard the money center? No, the bourse quarter is hidden be- yond its southeastern limit. The bourse of commerce district escapes it entirely, as do the nelghborhood: of the Bank of France, the ministry of finances and the Hotel de Ville. Is the boulevard the center of pleasure? Nohot even this! Mong- martre, with the Champe-Elysees and Bols' make the boulevard seem old-fashioned—there is not one great night restaurant upon:it! The pleas- ures of Paris neither help nor hurt the boulevard. Its animation is highest twice a day when dancing palaces, race tracks and theaters are filled—at 5 o'clock in the afternoonm, the hour of the pink drink, and at 10 p.m., before the theaters let out! S0, 1t 1s queer. Here is an avenus, no_broader, than many another, rather ugly, not well bullt, shaded by dusty tregs, far from parks and gardens, i l | sclousness, this life knows itself! ‘The Grand Cafe is gone. One of the most famous boulevard cafeS has closed its doors, to be transformed to hotel and steamship offices by a Canadian company. They say that banks and big department stores are buylng up property after property. WI1IL they kill the boulevard? It is not likely. There is too much of it left. It is too much alive. public that Velocity of Light. THB first determination of the ve- locity of light was made by Romer in 1676. The method was based upon the observation of the eclipses of Jupiter's satellites, phenomena of frequent recurrence and-easy of ob- servation. Assuming that light re- quires time whereir » move from place to place through space, the in- ferval between successive eclipses ‘would appear too short when the earth is approaching Jupiter and too long when the earth is receding there- from. Romer found in his observa- tions that such was the case, and that the interval was conditioned by the rate of speed at whigh the earth changed places relatlvely with Jupi- ter. From . these constants Romer computed that light expended about sixteen and one-half minutes in cross- ing the earth’s orbit. From this is de- duced a velocity of about 186,600 miles & second. —_— An elephant canmot see an object outlined against the sky at more than thirty yards. ’