largely going to the cider mill or other junk piles, where, in the words of Mr. Phillips, they rightly belong.

It looks as if the apple men this year had for once in their lives found the sane, safe and sound policy. There is little hope, considering the tremendous volume of box apples, selling at lower prices than could have ever been imagined, and very large supplies of barrelled apples in all large producing sections still to be sold, that the rise in any market on any particular variety of apples will be sudden or anything but very moderate. We can, however, believe that it is a year in which apples bought at the prevailing prices of $1.75 to $2.00 per bbl. for No. Is will not lose money, and this fact must give encouragement to every apple dealer to continue his work and move that portion of the crop for which he has an outlet. In fact, in this word "outlet" lies the guide for our future action.

It is a year in which we must look before we leap. We must know where and how we are going to sell the various varieties of apples that we buy before we get in too heavy. In other years speculators in apples have been accustomed to make as heavy investments as their banking arrangements would permit, and then to look for storage facilities or for outlets thereafter. This year the fact that the farmers decided to take up most of the cold storage space themselves relieved us somewhat of the temptation of over-buying and made the buyers feel that they must know where to put the apples before they bought them.

Let this conservative line of action prevail throughout the year, and when we meet at Atlantic City we shall have no cause to regret our apple speculations.

Talking about taking a leap in the dark, I know whereof I speak. One night, about two months ago, I was foolish enough to go home alone in the dark. Late in the night, feeling somewhat chilly, I got up to find a blanket, walked out in the hall, and, before I knew anything about it, I had taken a fall out of myself by a rapid transit from the second story to the first without the medium of a stairway. Fortunately, I turned a somersault on my downward trip, and landed, to use a nautical expression, full-beam on, with the result of no broken bones but-quite a jar. The jar was of importance in several ways-first-it knocked quite a little ambition out of me to buy more apples. Secondly-it taught me the folly of plunging; that is the point of my remarks, and the moral is, An Apple Merchant Should Not Take A Plunge In The Dark.

By the time this issue of the Spy reaches you, you will have received from Mr. Border his second appeal for subscriptions for moderate amounts to enable the Committee on Advertising the Apple to spread the news in a practical way of the great size of the present apple crop, and to encourage the consumption of apples, particularly in our large cities. This appeal is well worthy of your support. A subscription of $5.00 to $25.00 by each member will give the Committee sufficient funds to advertise in the Grocers' Journals, in the daily newspapers, and to carry out one or two original plans of advertising which they have developed. Bear in mind that this is a good business for you. If it increases the consumption of apples even by a very small per cent, and thereby increases the price ever so little, your subscription will be returned to you many times over. I endorse his appeal thoroughly, and know that the Committee will act wisely in the expenditure of the money.

Report By Mr. Border,

Chairman of Advertising Committee

The Campaign is Under Way-Great Interest Being Shown Lend Your Financial and Moral Support

Baltimore, Md., Nov. 15, 1912.

What doth it profit a man to make two Apples grow where one grew before, if consumption be not likewise increased? I contend there is, and will be, no overproduction of Apples-it is rather UNDER CONSUMPTION. The capacity for consuming is great-much greater than the capacity for production.

I am happy to report to the Members of the Association that widespread interest is being manifested in the efforts of your Advertising Committee to crystalize sentiment in favor of doing the big things that should and must be done to save the Apple business from the fate that met the recent Peach crop; and if all the good ideas given your Committee by those prominent in the industry can be put into action, there will be an insistent clamour for the King of Fruits that will give the Apple Man that smile of Prosperity that won't rub off. Hear what W. B. Geroe has to say as to how Toledo is trying to solve the problem:

Mr. U. G. Border,

Baltimore, Md.

Toledo, Ohio, Nov. 1, 1912.

Dear Sir-Yours soliciting subscriptions for the purpose of advertising the Big Apple crop received. We are in sympathy with the movement, and for the past month we have filled our local reporters full of what it means to the consumers to have this enormous crop harvested and at their disposal.

I send you under separate cover copies of two Dailies of this City. Two others carried a letter of similar purport one week ago from us.

Besides we are advertising to one thousand customers every Saturday on the cheapness and the high quality of this year's crop. If every City will advertise this fact as thoroughly as Toledo will, there will be few left in ignorance of the magnitude and the opportunities of the American Apple in this good year 1912.

Yours very truly,

W. B. Geroe.

In due time will be published the suggestions and ideas received from other men, notably: Mr. J. H. Hale, Mr. E. H. Shepard, Editor of Better Fruit, Mr. H. W. Collingwood, Editor of the Rural New Yorker, Mr. Isaac Tuck, Editor of the New York Produce Bulletin, Mr. Howard I. Elliott, Pres. N. P. R. Rd. Co., and many others.

The Committee of the Produce Trade Association of Pittsburg is doing a fine work by sending out letters to all retailers in that vicinity asking their coöperation in helping dispose of the large Apple crop. A copy of this circular will be mailed to any Member who is interested. Is there any reason why a similar plan cannot be carried on in every large consuming centre?

Your Committee is doing all that its limited means will permit, but it needs not only your valued suggestions but your financial help as well, and a few dollars now will help us save from probably loss the most important of our undertakings.

Your President and Executive Committee authorized the Advertising Committee to raise a fund for immediate use to be spent for wide publicity the facts regarding the size of the crop and the moderate prices at which consumers may purchase Apples. This emergency plan will in no wise interfere with the consummation of that greater and general scheme which your Association proposes to put into execution another season. The Committee is working upon that plan now, and hopes with the aid of an educational campaign to enlist the support, moral and financial, of all the important Apple interests in America. Complete details of this plan will be published shortly and will be presented to the annual Convention at Atlantic City in August for your approval.

Let each Member of our Association appoint himself a committee of one to help collect a quick fund-Telephone or go to anyone you think should help especially do not forget your cold storage man, and request that a check be mailed at once so our work be not delayed. Don't confine your appeal to Members but go to anyone who is directly or indirectly interested in the success of the business.

Our problem now is one that requires for its solution the prompt. action of every Member. Many have already mailed their contributions. If you are among those who have forgotten to do so, won't you do this today? A moderate sum from each-say $10.00 to $25.00 will be sufficient to carry out the plan the Committee has in view. Send all suggestions and contributions to U. Grant Border, Chairman, 218 Light St., Baltimore, Md.

Special Notes

NEW MEMBERS

Since the last issue of THE SPY three applicants have been admitted by the Executive Committee, as follows:

ASSOCIATE MEMBER

The Alliance Bank

REGULAR MEMBERS

Rochester, N. Y.

The Fruchthandel-Gesellschaft, M. B. H..... Bremen, Germany

L. S. Town ..

North Rose, N. Y.

These names are credited to John B. Frey, N. G. Gibson and E. L. Stratton respectively.

"Will there be any stars in your crown

When at evening the sun goeth down?"

The slogan for 1913 is Six Hundred Members. Don't mislay those blanks sent you last month. Give us a chance to enter your name on the Roll of Honor.

CITIZENS NATIONAL BANK, MERCANTILE AGENCIES, PRODUCE REPORTER CO

F.J COOK, TREASURER.

If you have anything to ship or to SELL, municate with us.

Toledo Fighting in the Front Rank

Excellent Progress in Local Publicity
Let this Good Habit Spread

In a letter recently received from Mr. W. B. Geroe of Toledo he says: "We began a campaign four weeks ago on the cheapness and the excellence of this apple crop. Four daily papers have published letters from us in the past six days, and we are using our own medium every Saturday to this entire adjacent community."

For your information and as a guide to what you may accomplish in your own city or section, THE SPY prints in full one of the articles from The Toledo Blade:

Apples Never Better or More Plentiful

That the apple crop this year is the greatest and best in years is the statement of W. B. Geroe, of the Geroe company, wholesale fruit and vegetable dealers, who, in a letter to The Blade, says:

"Do you want to do something for the good of mankind? Not only the grower who lives in the country and the retailer who lives in the city, but the consumer who eats in the city, village and the country?

"If you do, enlighten the people on the enormous apple crop that is grown in the United States this year. The present use apples can be bought from the grocers from 75 cents to 85 cents a bushel. Fine, hand-picked fruit can be bought from the grocers today for a dollar a bushel. The best stock will be sold by the grocers in January, February, and December at about $1.25 a bushel for the very highest grade of apples grown.

"It has been years since apples were so clean and wholesome and low in price as they are today. The orchards have been sprayed three to five times during the growing season and the fruit is absolutely clean from scale and fungus, and never before in the history of Ohio have the apples offered to the public been so perfect and so absolutely free from defect, insects and disease as they are this year.

"If the grower could procure help, we could say to you that the grocers would sell these apples for 25 cents a bushel less than the above prices. Thousands of bushels are lying on the ground today through the orchards in the vicinity of Toledo that will never be picked up.

"I am writing you this letter because there has been a crusade started from the Atlantic to the Pacific to inform the people that they can buy fruit at a very cheap price and very high grade fruit at that.

"As the cost of high living seems to be the subject paramount to the housewives of this country, we believe that articles from time to time on the enormous crop of eatables grown in the United States this year would be of great interest."

OFFICIAL EMBLEM

Will all members not having a cut of the official emblem of the Association for use on their stationery, please advise the Secretary?

TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE COMMITTEE

Next month a report will be given by the Telegraph and Telephone Committee. Mr. Kerr has been actively engaged along these lines ever since the Convention and results will be brought to pass. The Committee has been doing splendid work.