Two Creamery Men Split Yakima County's Milk — Then Went to War Over It
Between them, E. E. James and Jacob Frazer control nearly every creamery in the county. Instead of agreeing on a price for milk, they are raiding each other's routes, poaching suppliers, and appealing to the state dairy commissioner over who can even run a Babcock test correctly.
The creamery business of Yakima County has fallen into the hands of two operators, E. E. James and Jacob Frazer, and with the exception of the Moxee creamery, they have control of the situation. One would think that between these two a satisfactory adjustment of a scale of prices to be paid for milk, as well as other differences, could be settled very easily, but it seems not; from reports they are waging merciless war on each other, which must be to their own loss and the dairyman's profit.
Recently Mr. James purchased from Mr. Bartlett the creamery business at Yakima City, purposing to run it as well as the one he owns in North Yakima. But Frazer, of the Ahtanum, who is somewhat of a "schemer" himself, entered Mr. Jones' territory and by making offers more tempting, got the milk of the district. Mr. James, however, sees in the Wenas valley, a tributary to the Yakima, a more profitable field, hence he is establishing a new creamery there, putting Mr. E. D. Fear, a recent graduate of Pullman college and a young man of promise, in charge.
One of the little side issues up between these rivals is the charge brought by each upon the other that he does not know how to make the Babcock test, and to settle the point an appeal is to be made to the state dairy commissioner to decide which one is making it right.
S. J. McEldowry recently assumed the management of the creamery that has been conducted by Wm. Bishop, Jr., at Haddock, Wash. This creamery is now handling about 4,000 pounds of milk per day and makes both butter and cheese. Mr. Bishop is arranging to establish a new creamery, and we understand is securing for same the latest and most improved machinery, including a De Laval separator of 2,500 pounds capacity, to be ordered from the Columbia Implement Co., Portland, Ore.
“From reports they are waging merciless war on each other, which must be to their own loss and the dairyman's profit.”
A century before anyone in Yakima argued about dairy consolidations and processor prices, two men quietly absorbed the county's creameries and then turned their price war on each other — with the farmer caught in the middle, briefly to his benefit. The Valley's dairy economy has since boomed and contracted many times over; the question of who sets the price of milk at the farm gate, and how few buyers a dairyman can sell to, is as live now as it was here.
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