but to drop them, after repeated notice, though some are old friends.
Four members have resigned and there has been one death, that of Mrs.
Charles Miller, of Waterbury, Connecticut.
We have added but 28 new members during the year, while we have
lost 55.
There have been 358 members since organization, of whom we still
have 138, 220 having dropped out.
Mr. T. P. Littlepage, as chairman of the Committee on Incorporation,
reported at some length on the advisability and the possibilities.
On motion of Mr. R. T. Olcott, the question of incorporation was left in
the hands of the committee with power.
The following Nominating Committee was elected: Col. Van Duzee,
Mr. Weber, Mr. Bixby, Mr. Smith, Mr. Ridgeway.
The following Committee on Resolutions was appointed by the Chair:
Dr. Morris, Mr. Bartlett, Mr. Olcott.
Moved by Mr. Littlepage: That the association request the Secretary of
Agriculture to include in his estimates of appropriations for the next
fiscal year a sum sufficient, in his judgment, to enable the department
to carry on a continuous survey of nut culture, including the
investigation and study of nut trees throughout the northern states, such
nut trees including all the native varieties of nuts, hickories, walnuts,
butternuts and any sub-divisions of those varieties, and that a
committee of three be appointed to interview the secretary personally to
have this amount included in the appropriation.
[Motion carried.]
Mr. Olcott recalled that last year the National Nut Growers' Association
secured an appropriation, and he suggested that this would make it
easier for the Northern Nut Growers to do so this year.
MR. BARTLETT: It occurred to me that the boy scouts, with their
great membership and being often out in the woods, would be valuable
to the nut growers' association in hunting native nuts. I took up the
matter with Dr. Bigelow of the Agassiz Association, who is also Scout
Naturalist and I think he can tell us more about getting the boy scouts
interested.
DR. BIGELOW: I would suggest that you enlist also the interest of
other organizations for outdoor life. If I knew a little more definitely
what is wanted it could be exploited in definite terms in Boys' Life, the
official organ of the Boy Scouts of America, which has a mailing list of
over 100,000, and which reaches ten or twenty boys each copy. So you
have nigh on to 1,000,000 members who would be reached in this way.
My predecessor, Mr. Ernest Thompson Seton, has organized the
Woodcrafters, which consists of both boys and girls. It seems to me
that their service should be enlisted. They have done remarkably good
work. And there are other organizations such as the Camp Fire Girls. I
would suggest that some of you formulate a resolution and let me have
a copy of it to publish in Boys' Life.
DR. MORRIS: I will say one word in harmony with Dr. Bigelow and
the possibility of enlisting the interest of these organizations. One of
our members, I think Mr. Weber, has found on a tributary of the Ohio
River a thin shelled black walnut that came down with the flood. He
has found two specimens at the mouth of the stream and he knows that
this particular thin shelled black walnut grows somewhere up that
stream. He would give $50 to anybody who would find that black
walnut tree.
I will give five dollars every year to any boy scout who wins any of our
prizes. That is a permanent offer. Or I will enlarge it perhaps, after we
discuss the matter further by including the Camp Fire Girls. I will add
others to that list. I will give five dollars to any member of one of those
organizations affiliated with us who wins any nut prize in any year, in
addition to our regular prizes. Furthermore we will offer to name any
prize nut after the discoverer, so that his or her name will go down in
history, perhaps causing much fame.
DR. BIGELOW: I have had my attention called to the fact that in the
West the beech trees are heavily laden with nuts. It suddenly dawned
on me that in all of my boyhood experience as a hunter and tramper, I
had never seen one edible beech nut in Connecticut. I know there are
many beech trees around Stamford, but I have not been able to find any
nuts. I have advertised for them but although I have received more than
a hundred packages from over the rest of the country, I have not seen
one single beech nut from Connecticut. Some of the old-timers say they
were once plentiful. I wonder whether beech nuts have disappeared
from Connecticut as have potato balls.
DR. MORRIS: In the lime stone regions they commonly fill
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