Mercedes Tribune (Mercedes, Tex.), Vol. 7, No. 26, Ed. 1 Friday, August 13, 1920 Page: 1 of 8
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mity Club Will Meet Monday, August 16th
asteiirized Milkd an
Cream
IMERCEDES PRODUCE CO.
PHONE 91
<3
N
. cr
tibrnic
Order Brick Ice Cream
far Sunday
MERCEDES PRODUCE CO.
PHONE 91
JJMN VII
MERCEDES. HIDALGO COUNTY. TEXAS, FRIDAY, AUGUST 18 1920
NUMBER 26
EAVY FUTURE CONTRACTS
FOR WINTER VEGETABLES
AMITY CLUB
IS TO MEET
MONDAY P.M.
3414 Mercedes Population
Increase of182.04 per cent
Representatives of Mercedes Lead-
ing Distributors Return from
Trips to the North and West and I President Elliott Calls
Bring Good News and Heavy Con- for Assembly of Farm-
tracts for the Winter Business. ers and Business Men
Letter froaMr.Sapiro
of California
V MARKET YET
SAYS E. H. PENNELL
% \ f; \
laager of Mercedes Produce coni-
|pany Finds Market for All He
Can Handle-
FINDS BUSINESS PROSPECT
UNUSUALLY GOOD ON TRIP
Charles Saladino Says Usual Mid-
summer Business Depression
Missing This Year
A joint meeting of the Valley Am-
| M-v cll,h “d "t/Iirnu-K, 1“teresfed Atent of its Ativlties; vaiiie of
an absolutely sound plan for you
without cldser personal conference as
to details. +
Your letter of July 1st states that
you would like me to attend a con-
ference at Texas for from three to
six days.
I could not be present under any
circumstances before' the latter part
of October.
If you desire such a conference,
you could in the meantime prepare
complete statements of the situation
in your district, listing every local
association; its capital stock; *he
character of its physical assets; gen-
BUsiness and crop outlook ih the ;he formation of a marketing system ^roductg now bandled by it and in
Middle West are unusually good this: ilas been called for Monday afternoon; prospect; number of members of
year, according to Charles Saladino at 2:30 o’clock by President. J. J.
of the firm of Acker, Jones & Sal-1 Elliott, of the Amity club. At this
LA market with the lid taken off,”
the way E. H., Pennell, manager
the Mercedes Produce Company,
iribed the results of a five weeks
he, has just completed to rrfiir- j adino, who has just returned from a j meeting plans for the organization
[ing centers throughout the Uni-' five weks visit to business centers in' °f the marketing system will he dis-
States. j Texas and , Oklahoma. “Everything
tt is too early yet to tell about] is in fine shape and we are going to
Ibage, the crop in the central Sec-i sell them lots of vegetables this fall”
|s is just being transplanted and i ML Saladino safd.
cussed,
Before Monday Mr. Elliott hopes to
each association, and form of con-
tract of by-laws binding each mem-
ber; statement of activities in rout-
ing: and shipping, and in marketing
as a whole.
Since Census of Ten Years Ago.
Brief Review of the City, Past
and Present. Prospects Are for
Greater Development This Fall
Than Has Been Witnessed at
Any Time Previously
The population of. Mercedes is
3,414, according to the United States
census report, made public Thurs-
day. The bureau reports that this
is an increase of 2,205 persons or
182,(04 per cent during the past ten
years.
Encouraging as this report is, re-
flecting not a boom but a steady
growth since the town, was establish-
ed in 1907, it scarcely does the com-
munity credit and is a little under
the estimate as to what the popula-
You should also give a statement
have with him Judge Gregg of Aus- j ibe prgducts now actually handled |
tin who will discuss the legal phase© i by ^bese associations, and the yossi- j tion would reach. Since the census
was taken, in February, there has
been an unprecedented amount of
been held back a little by lack] Because of the splendid crops now; of the organization. Mr. Elliott pl|hs | bi^tieg of your entire district; also
lin, rowever, there, is plenty of being harvested and the prospect of: to have’’Judge Gregg visit a nuta- j a statement of the marketing points
for this to come out before Oc- better fall crops wholesale houses her of Valley towns discussing, this j for u'r products, and the time of de-
phase of the situation. Although j iivery> a'nd other commercial eondi-
definite dates necessarily cannot be j tjpns df importance regarding com-
ity he said. are not exerting their usual mid-sum-
Pennell said that his company mer depressing influence upon rural
until Judge Gregg
Elliott is planning
ai’:petitive sales,
for'
You would also provide me
fid specialize on spinach; cabbage business he found. “Oftem in the announced
beefs and that, with • their two ( mid-summer months wholesalers are I riyes, Mr.
Ints they would be able to handle j inclined to discourage rural trade, j speeches • at Brownsville, San Beni-; typjcal copies of article: of :n
lm six to eight cars daily. “We to a certain extent, this they gener-! to and Mercedes. poration, by-laws and c uti vu t-i
getting known by the quality of ally do by filling all orders short the j with the executive committee the - these existing associations,
product and no\\ we can go j aroouqt requested. this yeai, how- pj-opogition of a contract of organs- You could probably get these re-
[.riger than , we ever have before, ever, the rural dealer is getting just j zation witb Aaron Sapiro, San Fran- ports completed by September 15th.
so,
The spinach deal, [ rural sections are prosperous and j growers association of that
zation.
Rapid as the grdwth has been dur-
ing these*two years the next year
should equal or surpass them both.
In May the company placed on the
market the north Capisallo tract
Despite the fact that the summer
months are supposed to he the most
difficult for the land selling com-
panies, the Stewarts have brought
two train loads of excursionists to
the tract each week and more .than
one-half of the tract has been sold
and it is expected that the entire
holdings will be disposed of by Oc-
tober 1st.
Few of these sales have been in
building in the community and the
population lias materially increased.
The strength of Mercedes, howey- j amounts exceeding forty acres >ikL
er, cannot be "estimated by the popu- j many liave been in smaller tracts,
lation within its city limits. In the: In almost every instance the jpui *
country surrounding the town and i chasers have signified their intention
| tributary to it commercially it is es- j of moving from their northern homes
i timated that there is at leasi bn-:- to their \ alley -property,
j family to every forty acres. This J Already this influx of new resi-
Witbout making
Mercedes about 15,000 people. * a single effort to attract patronage
Mercedes was founded in
Capisallo Townsitc Company through almost to its capacity every night
, „ . . . . , ... . * „ | Iiuius cumins tea uy ocywmmm wain, i would make the trading population of dents has started,
can place*, our stuff in any mar- about -everything he . wants for the Cisc attorney, who organized the, if SO; i COuld have approximately 8 1 Mercedes abou* 15 000 neop’e
* ana:^Tp.rc^ ^ ««
r^be the first off and there are! While not prepared to discuss bus:not come to the Valley before Octo- tract for submission to you and ‘ C-a&isall° Townsitc ConH»a“> thioug-i a mos o its capaci y cvei. ni&n
i caa devotPfl tn coin-ich: mess deals comnleted bv hi n-elf on , , V- r++1 lntoi . 1 f01 submission to you and t_. (the foresigbt of officials Gf the St. and the majority of the guests are
1500 aci-es devoter, to spinach, -n,esp deals completed by himoclt on ber. While this date is a little later nther loader* .some time between Louig Union -TvUst .Company. Tim-, either 'prospective purchasers or
American Rio Grande Land and Ir- those who have purchased and are
now coming to Mercedes to locate..
Commencing in September the in-
crease in both town and tract popu-
lation will be heavy. A
:e vicinity of Mercedes. For this,
rding to Mr. Pennell, there is
lost always a good market. The
luce company buys from the farm-
land it takes the risk of specula-
and does its own grading and
Icing. This applies also, to car-
and beets of which the company
le has a patch of 180 acres.
Lr. Pennell also took up with in- j
'itial men at the marketing cen-;
the car situation and is inclined
his trip Mr. Saladino expressed him-
self as being more than pleased with
the prospect for a wonderful winter
ber. While this date is a little later other leaders, some time between
than the Amity club-would like the j October 20th and 25th, at Mercedes,
intervening time will be spent in j if this plan would meet your ap-
clearing up technicalities and getting | proval, I could then present it to
foi Valley pioducts. The people j readiness for the arrival of the j your general meeting of farmers two
have -the money this year and they j expert.
will want what we grow,” lie said. | Mr. Sapiro Writes
-o———-
CHAMPION BABY DIES
rigation Company was organized to
develop and irrigate the country.
, How well theyf have done this is
or three clays later, and then ad-t,|f: fMt ,hat the Mcr_
vise with you on such further sub- j ^ canal system is admlttedly Qle
most efficient in the Valleys and, with
Commercially the town has tried
to keep pace with the growth of its
Dr. H. H. Hariington, Mi. Sapiio has | plete^ the co opeiati\e oiganization. j exception of the Brownsville Land population. The entire business dls-
John the eighteen months
lie encouraged over the outlook. °1(I son °f Mr. and Mrs. Dan Cham-
|ese men have promised to lend Pi°n, died Saturday afternoon as the
|11 the assistance possible in get- result of injuries received while play
cars. As far as the spinach, inS- The baby pulled a large flower
is concerned, it will be out of stand from its pedestal, the falling
I way before the time for the car j vessel struck the child in the pit
ftage becomes acute,” he said, i of the stomach, knocking him to the
le stating that he was not fa- '■ ground with such force that a con-
ir with the general ice situa-! mission of the brain was caused. Dr.
throughout the Valley Mr. Pen- j Hedrick of Camp Mercedes and Dr.
said that the company could
enough take care of the local
on. “We are prepared, if nee-
i , to work our two plants twen-
* r hours a day, and have no
but that we can supply all the
ecessary. Last yeai*, for in-
i' >, we shipped many cars of ice
> aces less fortunate.”
i (Continued on page 4)
FROM AGCIDENT HURTS replied, regarding the proposition, as
follows:
Dear Dr. Harrington:
I appreciate your very compliment-
ary letters.
I am enclosing various pamphlets
which will give j you some idea of
the different associations and the
kind of contract they make with the
growers. - - )
None of these are accurately adapt-
able to your particular problem.
Local associations for packing
should be organized wherever the
perishable products are grown.
Secondly you should have a mar-
keting association without ' capital
stock which will route, ship and maiv
i ket the products packed by all of the
local associations, giving due credit
Neal were summoned but were unable
to keep the child alive for longer
than one hour.
Following funeral services at the
Catholic church, which were at-
tended by a long procession of
mourners, both American and Mexi-
can friends of" the family, interment
was made Sunday afternoon in the
Catholic cemetery.
This service would demand a large
amount of preliminary work and act-:
ual attendance in Texas for from j
three to six days, and time spent in j
travelling to and from Texas, in- i
volving approx ildately a total of two
weeks.
Very truly yours,
Aaron Sapiro.
and Improvement Company system at trict, some eleven blocks, have been
Brownsville is the only one of the; pavtd, cement side-walks, fourteen
older companies that have not gone! feet wide on Texas avenue and ten
through receiverships at some time
in their history.
Almost co-incident with the estab-
lishment of the town building of a
feet wide op the other business
streets have been built. A modern
sanitary sewer system and disposal
plant have been installed, the city
permanent nature was started. The; has purchased 26 acres of land for
first brick -buildings in the town were | use as a dumping ground, a modern
the hotel, the original offices of the ■ city hall, jail and fife station has
American Land and Irrigation Com- been built, the fire department has
pany, now occupied by the Bank of been motorized. The electric light
The Guaranty State Bank of Ed-
inburg will be ready for business
about September first. This hank i commerce and Trust Company, the1 system has been improved and the
was chartered to do business in Tex- j buiidjng occupied by the Tribune and , business district equipped with or-
as recently with a capital of $25,000.1 ^ Hidalgo County Bank building namental “white-way” cluster lights,
The officers are M. C. Driscoll j The rural growth of the town, j a new high school building is being
president; George Herder, vice-pres- however, has been within the past; constructed at a cost of $3',000.
idenU, Milton A. Green, active vice- two years when the eAVst Tract and During the past sixty days f ap-
president and J. Henry Quota, cash- the Llano Grande Tract wtre placed proximately $50,000 worth of business
ier. The directors are A. J. Ross, on the market and the Stewart Land j construction has been completed and
to and for superior grade and qual- j M. C. Driscoll, W. L. Lipscomb, Geo. Company of St. Louis, the largest there is at present $200,000 worth of
ity of- products. - [Herder, Jr., Lee M. Green, Geo. P. colonization company in the world, construction under way. In this fig-
It is almost impossible to work out ‘ Brown and Milton A. Green. vn . pieced in cliaS'ge of the colon:-j ure is not counted the $80,000 flume
;iMELY FARM TOPICS
Copyright 1820
By Hoyt Printing C unpauj
All rights reserved
By Dr, H, H. HARRINGTON
Agricultural Tkector A. F. G. L. and I. Co., Mercedes, Texas
The Onion Crop.
^ receive from time to'1 time s
Vnany inquiries in regard to the
^ability of planting onions, and
o the proper time for planting
seed. I have always regarded
L-nion crop as a pretty big gam-
Jfocauso it is an expensive crop
fliso, tlie price is not always sta-
attractive, and in many cases
ip is severely injured by the
ps.” The thripp is a minute
|t, about as large in' diameter as
joss section of an ordinary pin,
[considerably less size than the
of a pin, that gets into the axle
lie onion blade or leaf and sucks
[juices of the paint; finaliy sap-
its vitality entirely, and caus-
Ithe plant to turn yellow and die.
lannot he controlled by arsenical
ms, and +he only remedy is a
ict poison, and some tobacco ex
seems about the only remedy of
kind that is in the least effect-
If they get a good start in
ice of the first poisoning, even
|bacco extract will not control
they multiply so rapidly; so
one is liable to lose his entire
Then again, all soils are not
lited to onions. The crop needs
leh soil, open or porous, with ah
idance of organic matter;* that
organic matter that is in a state
lecay, which we commonly de-
nominate as humus in the soil. This
organic matter may b€ of either veg-
etable or animal origin. Barn yard
manure, if well rotted, or ;.f ap-
plied a sufficient time in advance
of transplanting the onions to be
come in a well rotted condition, is an
effective onion fertilizer; to be of
any real benefit however, large quan-
tities must be applied. Because of
the presence of decaying organic
matter in new soil, as on the West
Tract for example, such land is usu-
ally adapted to onions, if it is not
too stiff; that is, if its mechanical
condition is right. The tobacco de-
coction may be bought already pre-
pared, as in •'■‘Black Leaf 40” con-
taining 40i% of nicotine, or one may
buy the heavy leaf tobacco, and give
it three successive treatments of
boiling water, and make an extract
in that way; but in the latter ease,
the strength of the solution would
have been indefinite; so that the
“Black Leaf 40” is a better prepara-
tion. But I do not believe that
thripps can be controlled effectively
by spraying with “Black Leaf 40”
even, unless the plants are sprayed
in. advance of the attack and at in-
tervals after the spraying is begun,
of every week or ten days. Hence,
I would hesitate to plant a very
heavy crop in onions, unless I was
1
willing to gamble on the crop, and | 8th of September, and as l:ue]r>s th
felt that I could afford to lose most j 25th of the month. He st le' - tlia
of the money which I had invested., planting seed too early, add - Icttin
However there are some vesy sue- j the plant8 remain jn the seed be '
cessful onion growers in the Val-1, . . _ ... .
ley; men who grow scarcely any. j too long, ns a fruitful source c: seoc
thing else from one year to another, j stems, “doubles” and “std rm'Vv
and who, through a series of years, j He advises also that, because of the on the onion crop unless you are
make money; because they are “ j”" j high cost and scarcity of the so. d
inis year, that particular care should
be exercised
hope will reach others who have not
been To see me in regard to planting
an cnion crop; but I want tp'em-
phasize- that which I have so often
given before, which is already em-
bodied in this letter; do not “plunge”
may
iin-ancially independent. It may be
well to .put in a few acres, but be
to bridge the disaster, which
come during any one season. ! be exercised in the preparation of j careful about going too heavy.
One of the most successful, if J ibe seed bed. It should bq we!’ j There is another warning that I
not the mst successful onion grow- plowed, worked down fihe. and wa- i want to give in connection with the
ers i nthe Valley, is Mr. Chas. Volz tered before planting, in order to! crop, and that is that the seed of
He has had some pretty oack the soil and make a firm bed.
This will, of course, "give opportuni-
ty for the sprouting of surplus weed
seeds; which may later be destroy-
of Mission,
severe trials, but also some very suc-
cessful years. I think be lias per-
haps given the crop more stpdy than
any other man in the Valley, at
least more than any other man that
I knoiv of. Hence,. I am going to
repeat here, for the benefit of the
farmers on this canal in substanc-
what he has said to me, in regard to
the planting of the crop. He states
that, under average conditions and
soils, September 12th to 15th is the
earliest that the seed ought to be put
in the beds; planting 20 to 25 pounds
per acre in 12-inch rows. In 8 to 10
weeks, it may be expected that the
plants will be large enough to trans-
plant to the field; but if a large crop
is contemplated, a part of the seed
bed should be started as early as the
the onion deteriorate more rapidly,
tlmn those of any other truck crop.
If they are one year old, they are
of very little value. They are scarce
ed. When the ground is dry enough! this year and high priced. Therefore
It is probable that a good many last
year’s seed will be put on the mar-
ket at reduced prices, and there will
be a great temptation for the faimier
to buy these cheaper seed; especially
if he is unfamiliar with the fact that
they are not likely to germinate. If
you ask the seller if they are fresh
seed, he will probably “not know,”
if be is attempting to put off on you
last year’s seed. Be certain to get
from a reliable dealer, and be cer-
tain to have him state that they are
fresh seed.
Burning Off Fields
It is time now to prepare the
to pulverize, work the soil one inch
deep, but do not dig it up 3 to 4
inches in depth, as this depth would
be liable to bury the seed, when
they are watered again after plant-
ing, so deep that they would not ger-
minate. By shallow cultivation of
the settled seed bed, there is less
likelihood of bringing up a new crop
of weed seeds. On the heavier soils,
the irrigation in advance of planting
and firming the seed (bed is of spe-
cial importance.
This information confirms the ad-
vice which I have given out to 'a
good many men personally, but I
ground for crops to be planted this
fail, either for early winter or late
winter , harvesting. There will be a
great temptation, where there is con-
siderable , amount of vegetation on
the ground to burn it off, as the
easiest way of handling it. It would
be a great mistake to do this. In a
climate, with as much continued heat
as this has, and as dry as this cli-
mate is, it is important that as much
vegetable matter be incorporated with
the soil as possible. It is essential
that not only the original amount of
humus, or organic matter, in the soil
should be maintained, but in many
cases, it should be increased. It is
a fundamental and essential principle
of good farming, under conditions
such as we have, that the humus of
the soil be kept up; so that every
character of green stuff that you can
turn under, whether weeds, grass, or
growing crops, is of material advan-
tage to the soil. While it may in-
evolve more work, and therefore in-
creased expense, to incorporate this
green matter with the soil rather than
to burn it' off, it is much better to
do it. Such a course postpones the
evil - day of commercial fertilizers,
iand more than pays in the succeed-
ing crop for the labor expended on
the preparation of the land.
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Hoyt, L. T. Mercedes Tribune (Mercedes, Tex.), Vol. 7, No. 26, Ed. 1 Friday, August 13, 1920, newspaper, August 13, 1920; Mercedes, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1017566/m1/1/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Dr. Hector P. Garcia Memorial Library.