And strange to relate, in the long list of items under the head of "Classes of Food," given in the Federal Bulletin referred to, no mention is made of nut foods, either native or imported nut trees. Fruits, vegetables, meats, store groceries, everything is there but nuts.
"Nutty," do we hear someone suggest? Probably not in this audience of enlightened nut growers, but speaking to the general public we shall say, "Well, mebbe," like Uncle Lige of Niagara. Two bad years on the farm, four acres of tomatoes that didn't pay for the plants, nothing but soft corn and no potatoes compelled Uncle and Aunt Tompkins to open an account at the corner grocery. The first month the bill came in, Aunt Sally was all in a flutter when she audited the items: Sugar, 60; coffee, 40; oatmeal, 50; sugar, 75; ditto, 80. "Lige, you go right back to the store and tell that cunnin' clerk that he's charged us fer what we never got. We ain't had no 'ditto' in this house." Lige went to the store and returned, apparently a sadder but a wiser man. "Well, Lige," inquired the thrifty spouse, "Did you find out 'bout that 'ditto' we didn't get? What did you find?" Lige picked up his pipe, remarking, "Well Sally, I found I was a durned fool, and you ditto."
We are all waking up to the fact that we did not become "nutty" soon enough. We have found that our public agencies of conservation have been "durn fools" and farmers and other land owners "ditto", for not having inaugurated the systematic planting of productive trees along the highways and farm hedgerows and ditches, many years ago.
Norman Pomeroy used to say with becoming modesty that he took no credit for planting the trees that have made such a substantial income for his family, because "I had to be slapped in the face in the dark before I became wise, and then the natural improvidence of mankind came near spoiling Nature's tip when the children gratified their little stomachs in preference to planting for the future. Men are but children of an older growth, a wise man said. That is a true but sad doctrine. We all live too much in the present and for the present, forgetting that the future will soon be the present, if not for ourselves, for our children and our children's children. It takes time to realize on trees, for the stomach or the pocketbook. It requires sacrifice to get anything worth while and, waiting is the hardest kind of sacrifice, especially for people of small means. But it pays in the end."
The Northern Nut Growers' Association, is doing valuable work not only in the study and planting of nut trees, but in its propaganda. But I have discovered that the results of practical work and the worth of propaganda, are hard to bring home to public agencies, like Governors and Legislatures. The construction and maintenance of public highways are a state function. But that duty must be incomplete in our opinion until the state finishes its job by planting productive trees along the highways and public roads. How shall we bring this about? Adopt resolutions? Very good.
But did the Anti-Saloon League, for example, content itself with resolutions when it wanted real results in the halls of legislation? Not much. Our prohibition friends were very practical. They employed trained agents to present their cause everywhere and in every way calculated to do the most good.
Let me repeat to you tree planters the late Norman Pomeroy's favorite lines, as I recall them:
"The dead are eternized in stone,
The living, by living shafts are known.
Plant thou a tree and each recurring spring
The stirring leaves thy lasting praise shall sing."
President Reed: Prof. Chittenden, of Michigan Agricultural College will address you on "Native Nut Tree Plantations for Michigan."