agent that a carload of the purchasers of
these tracts was about to leave to look over their property. I have seen
the local manager hustle out, when he got that telegram, and hire every
mule in the community to come in and, with a plow, throw a furrow or two
to the rows of trees so that they could be distinguished from the weeds
they were growing among. As Mr. Littlepage has said, there can be no
success in such operations; and I feel, looking at it in a very broad
way, that this is a very good time to emphasize the point that those of
us who have the greatest experience in the growing of nut trees do not
feel that these enterprises are legitimate, or that they promise very
much success. (Applause.)

Mr. Pomeroy: I live just a short distance from Buffalo. A few months
ago--I got it on the very best authority--there was some salesman in
Buffalo who didn't have time to call on all those who wanted to give him
money for pecan propositions. He didn't have time, Doctor, he just had
to skip hundreds of them, he said; he was just going from one place to
another, making his collections. Buffalo is a city of only about 450,000
people and there must be some money being collected and sent in to
somebody.

The Chairman: Very glad to hear of that instance; let's hear of others.

Mr. Littlepage: I would like, if possible, to answer Mr. Smith's
question. I didn't know that he referred to facts about these
promotions, I thought perhaps he meant facts about nut growing.

Mr. Smith: You said you had made inquiries as to nuts, harvest yields,
orchard yields; it was those, particularly, that I had in mind.

Mr. Littlepage: Oh well, I could give those to you readily. There are
some very promising orchards, making a good showing under investigation,
handled under proper conditions and of proper size. I would not want to
say that those things are not possible. Talking specifically of these
overgrown schemes, one of them is recalled to my mind, a development
company in southern Georgia, that advertises very alluringly. It set out
one year a lot of culls; they all died. I am told that they went out the
second year and, without any further preparation, dug holes and set out
another lot of culls. They too died; and then they went out the third
year and planted nuts, and those trees, at the end of a year's growth,
were perhaps six or seven inches high, and the salesman from that
company, I understood, took one of the prospective purchasers o