The Spy

that it comes to us as one of the choicest gifts of nature. And now it will presently appear on our tables prepared in many appetizing forms, apple sauce, apple butter, stewed and baked, and especially as that universal favorite, apple pie, or even better still, apple dumplings. It will be flavored and spiced so that its very odor will make the mouth water. But why cook an apple? The raw fruit, just as it fell ripe and mellow from the tree and came fresh and crisp from the cool cellar or with the frost of the orchard still upon it, needs no culinary art to improve it. It melts in the mouth and sends its delicious sweets in a stream of exquisite sensations down along the whole digestive tract. A knife spoils it; let it be crushed and crunched in the mouth and then it gives out its richest flavor and yields the greatest satisfaction.

A WHOLESOME FRUIT.

The apple is one of the most wholesome of our fruits and has healthgiving and medicinal virtues of the greatest value. It starts all the secretions into vigorous action and floods the system with a fresh tide of life. It is a friend of health and a foe of disease. It is food, tonic, condiment and cosmetic, all in one. It imparts its own virtues, and its wine kindles brilliance in the eyes and its ruddy colors plant roses in the cheeks. One can hardly eat too many of them, and after the heartiest meal there is always room for at least one apple more. And an apple is a social fruit. It flocks in great multitudes and heaps in the orchard, and it draws human beings together in fellowship. Sometimes there is only one thing better than an apple, and that is another apple that is being eaten by a friend. One does not enjoy an apple so well alone: it suggests comradeship and fellowship, and then its colors glow in richer hues and its flesh is more. juicy. On a winter evening around the family fireplace it is a means of family unity and grace. Plenty of good apples will help to keep the children at home and in at night. When the neighbors come in the inevitable. basket of apples always puts everybody at ease and in a good humor. Among the blessings of the year let us number our great apple crop. Forty million barrels are none too many. They will be poured out upon our people in a rainbow shower, and will bring health and gladness into many homes.

Mrs. Heath Discovers Why Apples Are High

Baldwins Most Plentiful, But At Retail, Grocer Asks
300% Profit.--Makes a Trip From Railroad

Float to Store for Housewives' League.

From New York Sun, Friday, December 27, 1912

Mrs. Julian Heath of the Housewives' League went out yesterday to see why apples are costing the consumer so much. Her campaign against the high price of eggs had taught her where to go, and she was pretty well satisfied after an investigation of the apple market that the fault this time lies with the retailer.

Mrs. Heath's expedition started from the office of E. N. Loomis, president of the International Shippers' Association, and went all the way from the cars filled with barrels of Spitzenbergs, Stark's Delicious. Northern Spies and rosy Baldwins to windows of retail grocers far up town. The long apple docks at the foot of Barclay street were line with floats bringing apples from all the State over. Thirty-four cars came in yesterday, and the wholesalers told Mrs. Heath that this was a small number. At the height of the season there come an average of 100 cars, bringing 15,000 to 20,000 barrels, a day. And 75 per cent. of all the apples that come to the local market are Baldwins, as that is an apple that doesn't need all the care and attention bestowed upon its more aristocratic fellows. Mrs. Heath looked down the long dock to see barrels everywhere filled to the top with Baldwins. The wholesalers were asking $2.25 for a barrel of number one Baldwins, that is to say apples that measured two and one-half inches and upward. She was told that never before in the history of the market had there been such a supply of apples. During the last few years, said the wholesalers, thousands of acres and millions of apple trees have been set in every part of the country where an apple could possibly grow. This year the apple crop amounts to over 40,000,000 barrels. The crop is being ground into cider, evaporated, shipped in bulk. barrel and box and is going into a multitude of storages for winter use.

So the first thing to be noted down in the investigator's book was the fact that the prices we pay for apples can't be charged to the supply. MRS. HEATH DOESN'T THINK IT IS THE WHOLESALER'S FAULT THIS TIME. She watched the apples coming off the cars for a while, was told in the midst of the clamor and dust and confusion of their unloading that she ought to come down on the dock at a real busy time, and then having learned that the wholesalers were charging $1.50 to $1.75 for number two Baldwins, those under two and one-half inches started out for the retailers.

SHE SAID SHE WAS SURPRISED AT TWO THINGS WHEN THE TRIP WAS DONE. FIRST, THAT IT WAS SO HARD TO FIND ANY STORES LARGE OR SMALL THAT CARRIED BALDWIN APPLES, AND, SECOND, SHE WAS ASTONISHED AT THE PRICES CHARGED. SHE WENT INTO LITTLE GROCERIES ALONG WEST STREET, ALMOST IN SIGHT OF THE DOCKS THAT WERE OVERFLOWING WITH BARRELS OF BALDWINS, AND WAS TOLD THAT IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO GET BALDWINS, OR ELSE THAT BALDWINS WERE HIGH. SHE WENT FURTHER UPTOWN TO HEAR THE SAME THING. TOO HIGH OR TOO SCARCE, WAS THE INEVITABLE ANSWER TO HER REQUEST FOR BALDWINS.

In the second place, when she did get a price quotation, she almost gasped when she was told that number one Baldwins were selling at FIFTEEN CENTS A QUART OR THIRTY-FIVE CENTS A DOZEN.

Out came the note book and pencil again and the investigating committee of one did a little figuring. The result of this was that Mrs. Heath found that the retailer buying Baldwins at $2.25 a barrel and selling at fifteen cents a quart was making way over 300 per cent. profit. There are about ninety-six quarts in a barrel.

Now as the object of the Housewives' League is to find out just how cheaply the consumer can get his food and at the same time leave a decent profit to the shopkeeper there was more figuring, with this result: THE RETAILER WHO SELLS A QUART OF BALDWINS AT FIVE CENTS CAN MAKE A VERY LIBERAL PROFIT.

This then is the result of the trip around the apple market: The crop has never been so large. The groceryman with several lean years behind him is disregarding this fact as is the public. He has no pressure to keep his prices down and as a consequence the apple lover's pocket suffers.

Retail Price of Apples Cut

Housewives' League to Sell Baldwins Nickel a Quart From New York Evening Sun, December 30th

"Under the old apple tree" is to be the motto of Mrs. Julian Heath and the Housewives' League this week. To-day, beginning at 11 o'clock, under the Queensboro Bridge, you may buy apples, beautiful red Baldwin apples, FOR FIVE CENTS A QUART, the same kind you pay from 12 to 15 cents for in the stores.

Mrs. Heath sees an entirely new situation in the matter of the high price of apples. IT'S THE RETAILER, SHE SAYS, WHO IS KEEPING UP THE PRICE THIS TIME. So, in addition to selling the apples at the Queensboro market, a campaign will be made all the week among the retailers in the hope of getting them to come down with the price of Baldwins.

Besides the five cents a quart variety there will also be on sale by the Housewives' League fancy boxes containing 150 apples at one cent at piece for the apples, not the boxes.

Mrs. Heath will conduct this morning's sale in person.

Women Smash Price of Apples

Housewives' League, Successful in Cutting Retail
Charge, Will Open More Markets

From New York American, December 31st

The National Housewives' League opened its apple market in Fiftyninth street, under the Queensborough Bridge, yesterday. Selling apples at ten cents a quart below the general retail price, the women demonstrated their contention that the high cost of living is arbitrary. They did a heavy business throughout the day.

MRS. JULIAN HEATH, PRESIDENT OF THE LEAGUE, DECLARES GOOD PROFIT CAN BE MADE BY SELLING APPLES AT FIVE CENTS A QUART, BUT THAT THE RETAILERS THROUGHOUT THE CITY HAVE BEEN SELLING AT FIFTEEN CENTS.

Dr. Madison C. Peters, whose market at No. 227 West Eighty-third street has been so successful in forcing down prices of butter and eggs in that vicinity, intends to establish other markets immediately. He has

Mrs. Heath's expedition started from the office of E. N. Loomis, president of the International Shippers' Association, and went all the way from the cars filled with barrels of Spitzenbergs, Stark's Delicious, Northern Spies and rosy Baldwins to windows of retail grocers far up town. The long apple docks at the foot of Barclay street were lined with floats bringing apples from all the State over. Thirty-four cars came in yesterday, and the wholesalers told Mrs. Heath that this was a small number. At the height of the season there come an average of 100 cars, bringing 15,000 to 20,000 barrels, a day. And 75 per cent. of all the apples that come to the local market are Baldwins, as that is an apple that doesn't need all the care and attention bestowed upon its more aristocratic fellows

Mrs. Heath looked down the long dock to see barrels everywhere filled to the top with Baldwins. The wholesalers were asking $2.25 for a barrel of number one Baldwins, that is to say apples that measured two and one-half inches and upward. She was told that never before in the history of the market had there been such a supply of apples. During the last few years, said the wholesalers, thousands of acres and millions of apple trees have been set in every part of the country where an apple could possibly grow. This year the apple crop amounts to over 40,000,000 barrels. The crop is being ground into cider, evaporated, shipped in bulk. barrel and box and is going into a multitude of storages for winter use.

So the first thing to be note: down in the investigator's book was the fact that the prices we pay for apples can't be charged to the supply. MRS. HEATH DOESN'T THINK IT IS THE WHOLESALER'S FAULT THIS TIME. She watched the apples coming off the cars for a while, was told in the midst of the clamor and dust and confusion of their unloading that she ought to come down on the dock at a real busy time, and then having learned that the wholesalers were charging $1.50 to $1.75 for number two Baldwins, those under two and one-half inches started out for the retailers.

SHE SAID SHE WAS SURPRISED AT TWO THINGS WHEN THE TRIP WAS DONE. FIRST, THAT IT WAS SO HARD TO FIND ANY STORES LARGE OR SMALL THAT CARRIED BALDWIN APPLES, AND, SECOND, SHE WAS ASTONISHED AT THE PRICES CHARGED. SHE WENT INTO LITTLE GROCERIES ALONG WEST STREET, ALMOST IN SIGHT OF THE DOCKS THAT WERE OVERFLOWING WITH BARRELS OF BALDWINS, AND WAS TOLD THAT IT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO GET BALDWINS, OR ELSE THAT BALDWINS WERE HIGH. SHE WENT FURTHER UPTOWN TO HEAR THE SAME THING. TOO HIGH OR TOO SCARCE, WAS THE INEVITABLE ANSWER TO HER REQUEST FOR BALDWINS.