How Can Wisconsin Sell Milk Shipped to Chapel Hill for Half Cost of Local Milk

Higher-Bred Cattle Needed. . . H.H. Williams Points to Reason of Profitable Western Dairying

As H.H. Williams was walking along the main street the other day he noticed, drawn up by the curb in front of the store, an automobile delivery wagon bearing the sign, “Carnation Farms.” Having been in the dairying business for many years, he was familiar with the history of this great Wisconsin concern, so he stopped and talked a while to the man in charge of the automobile.

Later, telling a friend about the conversation, he said:

“The question occurs at once how can Wisconsin people extract the richest part of the milk and sell it down here in North Carolina for less than half of what we pay for milk?

“The answer is simply this: fine cattle. They don’t waste time with cows giving a gallon and a half or two gallons a day. They know it is waste. Their cows give four, five, six, some of them up to 10 gallons a day. Having high-bred cows, and getting this big yield, cuts down heavily the cost of production per gallon, enabling the dairymen to sell low and yet make a profit.

“The bull at the head of the ‘Carnation Farms’ herd cost $106,000 at public auction, and daughters of this bull will give 10 gallons daily. The price of the bull sounds high, but when the higher milk yield of pure-bred cows is taken into account, the cost of breeding is shown to be true economy.

“Here in Orange county the opportunity for dairying is excellent—all the better now that the nearby market for dairy products is growing so rapidly. Our land is far better suited to grazing and forage crops than it is to ordinary crop-farming. And in climate we have a big advantage over the Middle Western farmers who get so much better results than we do. We can let our cows stay outdoors during a far greater part of the year than they can, and that means a saving in feed.

“There is a great future for dairying here, then, if our farmers will heed the lesson of breeding, and not waste their money, time and effort on inferior cattle. If they go in for the best breed of cows, they can make a good profit and at the same time lower the price to the consumer.”

From the front page of The Chapel Hill Weekly, March 29, 1923