at Evansville, Indiana, beginning August 20, 1914, at 10 A. M., President Littlepage presiding.

The President: The fifth annual meeting of the Northern Nut Growers Association will now come to order, and I have the pleasure of introducing to you Dr. Worsham who represents the Mayor of Evansville.

Dr. Worsham: Ladies and Gentlemen of the Northern Nut Growers Association:

Some men are born to greatness and others have it thrust upon them. I stand in the position this morning of a man that has had his greatness thrust upon him. The secretary of the Evansville Business Association, who frequently takes liberties with me, told me a few minutes ago that, in the absence of our Mayor, I was to welcome you.

We extend to you a most cordial welcome to our thriving city. We are always glad to have associations of this kind meet with us, because they bring to us new ideas and new thoughts.

As I looked upon those nuts this morning my mind returned to the time when I was a boy, when my father, although a splendid business man who took advantage of most of the opportunities that presented themselves to him, neglected one of the best he had in selling one hundred and twenty-five acres of land across the Ohio River here, upon which there grow a number of native pecans. The only time we ever had any pecans from that place was when we got a German over there, direct from Germany. He couldn't speak a word of the English language but my father said to him, "Keep the boys out and get some pecans." He went down there with a dog and a gun and we got more nuts that year than ever before or since.

This city has the distinction, as I have learned since I came into the hall, of being the center of the nut growing district of the northwest. Another honor that our splendid city has. As you know we are here in the largest hardwood lumber market in the world; we have the cheapest and best coal of any place in the world; we have the greatest river facilities of any city along the Ohio River; we have six main arteries of railroad into our city, so it is easy to manufacture, easy to ship and easy to dispose of the products of our business in this grand, beautiful and well situated city.

Now gentlemen, remember that Dr. Worsham's telephone is 213, that I am representing the Mayor and Business Men's Association, and that we are perfectly delighted to have you with us. I hope you will have a good time. I thank you.

The President: Dr. Robert T. Morris will respond first to Dr. Worsham and afterwards Mr. Potter.

Dr. Morris: Mr. Chairman, Representatives of the Business Men's Association, Ladies and Gentlemen: In Chicago, I met an Englishman who told me he was going to "Hevansville." I did not know just where he meant but after hearing Dr. Worsham's speech, I understand.

This is no doubt one of the coming cities of the world. You have here the field that was fought for by the early settlers and the Indians, and the field that is to be the scene of many wars in days to come.

In the days to come, perhaps a thousand years from now, there may be four or five people to the acre living under conditions of intensive cultivation. This is just the sort of land that will support a population to the best advantage, and you have here conditions suitable for the crop that is to be the crop of the future. People do not fully utilize nature's resources until there is need for doing so. We have depended upon the cereals and the soft fruits and things of that sort, just as the early Indian depended upon the deer and the beaver. The time came when his beaver and his deer disappeared. We, like the Indian, take up first the development of simplest things in plant life. Later, under intensive cultivation, we shall be enabled to support a very much larger population on fewer acres.

We find that nuts contain starch and proteids in such proportion that they will fairly well take the place of meats and of other starches.

Now, this is not an opinion which is individual alone, but is the conclusion of authorities after examination of data. Chemical examination of nuts has been made by our Department of Agriculture at Washington and by chemists elsewhere. The nut crop, then, is to be perhaps the staple food crop for the people of the United States one thousand years from now, when we are depending upon methods of intensive cultivation for the annual plants.

It is true, of course, that three thousand years before Christ, the Emperor Yu developed in China a system of agriculture that is better than any European or American system today both as to production and transportation—perhaps including distribution. At the present time China is supporting a larger population to the acre than any other country.

All this comes to mind in response to the address of welcome by Dr. Worsham. Here at this point of our United States, there is already a center of the new movement for the development of the great future food supply of the world, a nut nursery center. Here we find also another feature of great consequence from the economic and politic side. We find honest nurserymen. That is a very important matter. As nations advance in culture the moral side develops, and as the ethical side develops there will be better representatives in the trades and in all callings. The nursery business is near to nature and for that reason simple people have assumed that nurserymen were nearly as white as snow. Those of us who have had some experience with them, know what it means to find honest ones. We deeply appreciate the fact that in this part of the country honest nurserymen are making a name for themselves and for America.

I know Evansville not only in this way that I have been speaking of but also in a professional way because of its doctors. There are two or three or four of the Evansville doctors—you do not know that as members of this Association, but I know it as a member of our great profession—who have placed Evansville upon the map. This city is best known throughout the United States in the medical profession because of some three or four Evansville doctors of the present and past.

Therefore it is with a double pleasure that I respond to the address of welcome given by Dr. Worsham.

The President: We will now hear from Hon. W. O. Potter of Marion, Illinois.

Mr. Potter: Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: This meeting to me is something out of the ordinary. I can remember that when I was a boy I knew every good hickory nut tree in the community where I was raised, but after I left my native heath and went into the practice of law and got into politics, I forgot all about the hickory trees until just a few years ago when, by accident, I picked up a nut journal. I don't know how it came into my possession but I got it and I read some article on the Indiana pecan, and I read an article on the development of nut trees in the south, and I got interested and commenced studying the subject. I wrote to the Department of Agriculture and got some articles on nut culture from Mr. Reed and others and became still more interested.

However, nut culture doesn't mix well with politics or law, and, therefore, it is more or less of a side issue with me. I have gone into nut culture only on a small scale. On my lot in the city of Marion where I live I have set out some pecan trees, and after a hard battle in court all day it is quite a pleasure to get home in the evening and to pull off my coat and to get on some old clothes and go out among my trees. There is nothing better to get one's mind off the daily combat of life.

I was very much impressed with Dr. Worsham's address of welcome and also Dr. Morris's response. I believe