Who Really Raised the Price of Milk?
A White River dairyman writes back: the condensery isn't being generous — feed, hired hands and land rent have all doubled, and the company still pays as little as it can get away with.
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.
Editor The Ranch:
In a recent issue of your valuable paper a communication appeared from J. M. Corp, in which he went on to show that the Pacific Coast Condensed Milk Company was responsible for a material increase in the prices of milk in the White River valley. I am willing to give credit to the condensery where it is due, but are not some of the statements by Mr. Corp rather misleading? For instance, he says that the condensery is now paying $1.45 per 100 pounds for milk, whereas before the condensery started in 1898 and 1899 the price paid was $1.05.
I hold that the condensery had very little to do with this increase, if any. At that time shorts and bran were $8 and $9 per ton; they are now $19 and $20. Then we could hire men for $20 and $25, and now we pay $30 and $35. Then rent for land was $4 and $5 per acre; now it is $8 to $12 per acre. Since 1898 the population of the cities of Puget Sound has greatly increased. Seattle has almost doubled in size. Alaska in the meantime has become a great consumer of our dairy products. The present good times justify a proportionate increase in price.
The condensery claims it pays 10 cents per hundred pounds more than the creameries. The condensery keeps the skim milk. The creamery returns it to be used as feed for hogs and calves.
I agree with Mr. Corp that the condensery is a good institution, but many things are not all they seem to be on the surface. The proprietor of the condensery is not in the business for the benefit of anyone but himself. He is a shrewd, wide-awake individual, who looks out for No. 1, and pays the farmers no more for their milk than he has to. He makes some of the dairymen of this section believe that he does better by them than anyone else. There are some of us, however, who differ from this view.
JOHN McGOWAN. Christopher, Wash.
“The proprietor of the condensery is not in the business for the benefit of anyone but himself... and pays the farmers no more for their milk than he has to.”
The fight is a familiar one: a single processor sets the price, and the farmers who sell to it argue over who is really being squeezed. The White River valley that McGowan knew as dairy pasture is now suburban Kent and Auburn, and Washington's surviving dairies still bargain from the weak end of a consolidated supply chain.
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