The Battle for the First Strawberry Crate
When J. E. Hampton picked the first strawberries of the season in Hover, the Kennewick-Richland Marketing Union intervened to ensure the credit went to Kennewick.
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.
J. E. Hampton picked a crate of ripe strawberries last Monday, which he intended to ship to the Davenport in Spokane, but the Kennewick-Richland Marketing Union had a representative at the depot, who wanted to buy the berries so the Union could have the credit of marketing the first crate of strawberries from the Kennewick valley. Mr. Hampton was obdurate at first and would not sell, but after much soliciting finally sold the berries to them, and Kennewick gets the credit and advertising, but the berries grew in Hover just the same.
“Kennewick gets the credit and advertising, but the berries grew in Hover just the same.”
This vignette illustrates the early-20th-century obsession with civic boosterism and the branding of agricultural produce, a precursor to the regional marketing identities that still define Washington's agricultural industry today.
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