The Price of a Cold Spring
Unseasonable weather caused Kennewick’s strawberry harvest to fall short of demand, costing local growers thousands in lost revenue.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The cold weather of the last week or ten days has cost the strawberry growers of Kennewick and Richland many thousands of dollars. Not only has the cold weather held the season back, but it has materially shortened the crop, lowered the quality and made it impossible for the Marketing Union to supply orders for thousands of crates at fancy cash prices. Last week alone, Sales Manager L. J. Blot of the Marketing Union was forced to cancel orders for local berries amounting to more than $100,000. With ordinary weather conditions, last week would have been the big week of the Kennewick-Richland berry season. As a result of the shortage, the marketing plans of the local organization have been badly upset. Not only has the shortage created a feeling of dissatisfaction among the buyers, but it has cheated local growers out of the opportunity to dispose of the bulk of their crop when prices were ruling high.
“The cold weather of the last week or ten days has cost the strawberry growers of Kennewick and Richland many thousands of dollars.”
Kennewick's economy was built on the promise of the early harvest, but this 1916 report highlights the perennial vulnerability of agricultural communities to unpredictable climate shifts. Even today, the Tri-Cities region remains deeply tethered to the whims of weather patterns that can make or break a season's profitability for local growers.
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