Fillmore County, Minnesota - Chapter 39: Creamery Interests, 1912

Rise of the Dairy Industry in Fillmore County - Early Farmers Kept a Few Cows for Home Use - Attention Turned to Stock Raising - The First Creameries - Farmers Benefit by Co-operation - The Present Creameries-~-Edited by E. L. Babcock.

The first settlers in Fillmore county engaged in wheat raising almost exclusively, and the virgin soil vielded twenty to thirty bushels to the aere, vear after year, No. 1, hard. For several years this staple had to be hauled across country to Mississippi points. With the coming of the railroad in 1868, Fillmore connty was placed in closer communication with the wheat markets, and there was a corresponding inereasec in wheat produetion. Soldiers had then been three years home from the war, much new land was being broken, and the county was becoming famous as a wheat center.

But the wheat decline, starting in 1878 and coincident with the big drop in wheat prices, caused the farmers to turn their attention to diversified farming and dairying. Progress in the direction of dairying, however, was slow. It is true that the early settlers brought with them a few cows for dairy and beef purposes, « few hogs which they marketed to some extent, and some poultry, but it was not until after the wheat failure that stock raising was considered as a leading feature of farm endeavor. Following the failure, Shorthorns and native cattle were bred, and a portion of the former large wheat fields were turned into pastnres. However, large herds were the exception rather than a rule, and dairving was conducted on only a small seale. At that time agricultural experiment in this country was in its infaney, and the modern method of acclimation was unknown. Corn brought trom more southern states and planted bere was an uncertain erop, owing to the late springs and early falls. It was believed that only tame grasses, like clover and timothy, could be raised here. Without corn and good grass, lillmore county beef could not compete with the better class of stock sold in the markei, nor could extensive dairying flourish under these circumstances. The average farmer owned four or five cows. A few herds were gathered here and shipped annually from this county to the western plains and ranges. Horses were raised to some small extent and sold for a time at profit in the northwestern markets, chiefly in the larger cities. Cattle raising, however, under such disadvantages brought little, if any, profit, and then, too, the market value of the horse soon fell. It was while the Fillmore county farmers were realizing less and less each year and while they were in doubt as to what branch of agriculture to adopt next, that their attention was attracted to the new process of making butter from cream separated from the milk by machinery.

The churning of butter had for many years been an irksome task on almost every Fillmore county farm. Most of this dairying was on a small seale and the butter of a poor quality, A farmer here and there kept as high as a dozen or more mileh cows, and established a reputation in the neighboring town for his wife's hutter that enabled him to realize a fair price for his product. But private dairying meant doubtful profits, slavery for the women on the farm and much annoyance and waste of time to the farmer and his hired help. Accordingly, efforts were made at different times in several of the towns and villages of the county to make butter on a larger scale, aud wagons were sent out in all direetions to gather the cream from the top of ihe cans, paying the farmer by the measured inch. The first effort im this hLne was made in the southeast part of the county, by William Beard, who lived near Frankville, in Allamakie county, Iowa, and sent men to Fillmore county to collect cream from the farmers.

The gathered cream plants were usually owned either by individuals or by the merchants and town people, who formed themselves into stock companies, though in one or two instunces a few farmers formed stoek companies among themselves and bought cream by the inch throughout a territory which often covered ten or fifteen miles in every direction.

The new separator process promised to do away with all the objectionable features of making butter at the farm, and to realize profits instead of the losses experienced by both the owners and patrons of the gathered cream plants. The separator had been invented in Sweden early in the eighties; accounts of it had been published and its merits discussed in all ihe leading agricultural papers. Creamery supply houses throughout the West were advertising the new machines widely and commended them to those who were engaged in the manufacture of butter. Co-operative separator creameries were already in operation 100 miles south of Fillmore county in Iowa, and the separator process had been adopted by the established creameries in the Illinois and Wiseonsin districts. It was represented that the separator would skim so clean that but a small fraction of 1 per cent of butter fat would remain in the milk, and the separated milk could still be used as valuable feed for young stock on the farm.

With the belief that the use of the separator would make the manunfaeture of butter profitable and that dairying would prove a safe business for years to come, the Fillmore connty farmers, after careful inquiry and investigation, formed themselves into co-operative associations. They borrowed money to the amount of many thousands of dollars, erected creamery buildings, bought separators, churns, butter workers, boilers, engines, vats and pumps, hired skilled butter-makers, and commenced those shipments of butter to the eastern markets which have increased steadily from year to vear, and in return for which money to the amount of many millions of dollars has been paid to the ereamery patrons.

Since the establishing of the dairy industry, and m conneetion with it, the Fillmore county farmers have adopted the intelligent and safe policy of diversified farming. No large fields of any one crop are longer grown, but instead many different crops, are put in, so that there is certain to be each year a good yield of soinething, principally corn, oats, flax, clover and grasses. To add to the resources of the county, it was discovered that the former belief that tame grasses could not be grown was erroneous, for now elover and timothy, millet «and grasses of all varieties grow here in great luxuriance and possess such unusual qualities that our butter excels in flavor and body that produced in other states. Corn, too, whether from acclimation of the seed or from longer seasons or from better cultivation, or from all these causes, has become a safe crop, and next to grass has become the chief erop.

The improved economie conditions in Filmore county since the introduetion of the co-operative ereamery are apparent on every hand. Farm lands have risen in value and $100 an aere is not now considered an unusual price for a well improved farm, The small houses or log huts of the earlier period have given way to spacious farm houses well furnished and arranged for the convenience of the housewife. The straw sheds and rough stables have been replaced by the big barn with plenty of room for cattle, horses and hundreds of tons of hay and feed. The grain and corn binders, rakes, hay loaders and stackers, ewtivators and machinery and tools of ail kinds are sheltered in well built sheds. Every farm has a granary, an artesian well or a deep tubular well and a windmill, sometimes with gearing and attachments for grinding feed. The fences are of barbed or woven wire and in good repair. The stock is of good breed and is improving rapidly from year to year. The seed for crops is better selected. The fields are plowed in the fall and fertilized abundantly from the barnyard and tilled with the greatest eare. The roads are better worked, graded and drained, and each year more miles of gravel are added and travel made more easy to the creamery and the market. There is a school house, comfortably built and well equipped, within easy reach of every house. The farmers from being the debtor class have become the creditor. They buy more and better goods at a less price than formerly and pay for what they get in cash whieh they receive from the creamery without fail every month. They drive better rigs, or even automobiles, and travel more, study more, deal more with one another, are more in touch with business, acquire experience in bookkeeping and money matters - in short, the status of the Fillmore county farmer and his family has improved in every respect, and he himself attributes this changed economic and soeial condition to the co-operative separator creamery of which he is always a patron.

Great credit is due to the farmers of Fillmore county for fostering the co-operative creamery idea, and there have been so few failures that the good work has gone on almost unrestrained unti] it is altogether our greatest industry. So, with a soil that raises the best grasses in the world, the people look to see the returns increased many fold as the years go on. The flavor that our better gets from the sweet and nutritious grasses enables Fillmore county butter to top the market in the eastern cities.

The large returns from milk and butter in the past few vears have encouraged the farmers to breed better cattle, and the number that are using pure bred dairy sires has increased very materially in that time, and in another five years will add many full-blood and high-grade animals to our herds. Many fuil-blood and high-grade dairy herds have sprung up in the past few years. The dairy cow is queen of the farm and one of the greatest mortgage lifters in existence. She is virtually a machine which turns the products of the farms into greatest profit. In order to get the largest returns her ways and her disposition must be understood. She affects almost any branch of farming and she is the most economical producer on the farm. There are at the present time about 62,000 cattle in the county, 22,000 being dairy cows.

The annual report of the Dairy and Food Department of the state of Minnesota gives a reeupitulation of the creameries in Fillmore county. In the following list, gathered from that report, ihe name of the creamery association appears first, then

An effort has been made to present in this history the story of all the present creameries in the connty, but a number of the secretaries have failed to furnish the desired information. A few typieal histories of the several institutions follow:

The Amherst Co-operative Creamery, located on the northeast quarter of the southeast quarter of section twenty-seven, Amherst township, was organized February 11, 1904. The first officers elected were: J. C. Henderson, president; Oscar E. Lewis, vice president; EH. L. Babcock, seeretary; C. O. Blagsvedt, treasurer; William E. Griffith, Thomas Anderson, 0. M. Blagsvedt, M. O. Blagsvedt and I. J. Eddy, board of managers. Tie creamery was organized under the association plan, with sixtyfour members, and a pledge of 414 cows. The sum of $4,500 was borrowed on association notes to build and equip a creamery and house for the buttermaker, the same to be paid from a sinking fund created by deducting one cent per pound for each pound of butter manufactured. The building was finished anc the first butter manufactured on July 5, 1904, with Areh A. Furnham as buitermaker. The first year's business amounted to $7,414.51. Sinee then the business has been: 1905, $18,076.74; 1906, 421,559.44; 1907, 436,596.87; 1908, $42,938.54; 1909, 446,- 927.73; 1910, $50,067.90; 1911, 41,259.84; total, $264,841.92.

The annual report for 1911 showed a total expenditure of over $8,000.00 for buildings, machinery, repairs and improvements, and the debt all paid from the one cent sinking fund. At present there are over two hundred patrons furnishing creain from about 1,000 eows. There have been only two changes in the officers, I. M. Ward taking the place of O. H. Lewis, and

Car] G. Knudson in place of William E. Griffith, both retiring parties having moved from the siate. Business is increasing daily, the creamery having paid the top prices for butter fat, besides meeting all its operating expenses and reserving about 41,000 in the sinking fund.

Granger Farmers' Co-operative Creamery Company. This association was organized February 9, 1911, with the following officers: President, J. A. Leudwig: vice president, J. Darrah; secretary, J. E. Burkholder; treasurer, IF'. L. Damon; directors, A. A. Bigalh, N. G. Tlutehison, L. B. Pratt, R. N. MeLeod, and Joe Hays. The building was ereeted in the spring of 1911, and few alterations have sinee been made, though a new vat has been added, and the material is on the ground for a new storeroom. 'lhe creamery has about 175 patrons, owning about 1,200 eows. In the early days there was a cream station here operated hy the Beatrice Creamery Company. The farmers, upon organizing, purchased this old building, which had not been used for ereamery purposes for many years, and replaced it with a new brick building, said by traveling men to he one of the best in the county. When the creamery started there were about seventy-five patrons. To this number more than a hundred have been added. The prospects for the future are of the best.

Reeeipts: Received for butter shipper, $16,650.73; received for buiter sold to patrons, $612.42; received for butter sold in Granger, 4163.85; received for buttermilk, $102.70; total receipts, $17,529.70.

The Farmers' Co-operative Creamery Association, of Ostrander, was organized February 27, 1906, the following names being included. among the organizers: G. W. Troupes, Q. A. Kolin, A. Gullikson, C. G. Gullickson, J. T. Halling, Il. M. Uellickson, F. W. Kohn, C. E. Keenan, N. IT. Miland, A. F. Tangen, A. O. Christopherson, J. J. Hanson, E. Christopherson, C. Jacobson, O. P. Hadland, G. H. Hadland, §. O. Ialling, Herman Bien, J. 8. Johnson, Albert Bratrud, H. C. Aarnass, A. M. Hanson, J. H. Dotzenrood, B. I. Nordgaarden, K. Jonson, W. J. Hardie, H. O. Thoreson, Jolin Shay, J. R. Roberts, Matt Sween, Olaf Sween, Matt lverson, Peter Hendrickson, Mrs, M. Gilbertson, H. Norby, EF. N. Vigum, A. M. Anderson. The first officers were: President,