HUSBANDRY: Dairy Show

One industry which is waxing in the South is the dairy business. Because the climate is mild and the grazing season long, in the past five years Kraft-Phenix, Southwestern Dairy Products, Southern Dairies (subsidiary of National Dairy

Products), Pet Milk and Borden’s have scattered plants throughout Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee. Since 1927, dairy stock in the South has upped from 5,370,000 head to 5,761,000. In St. Louis, livestock centre and a Southern gateway, a permanent dairy exhibit was recently established in the four-year-old Arena, a giant red-&-yellow mushroom located just over the southern boundary of Forest Park. But few Southern-bred cattle won any of the big prizes offered at the 25th annual National Dairy Show held at the Arena last week.

The atmosphere of the show was gala, if varied. There were circus acts, pet stock judging, live stock judging, vaudeville, dramatic presentations by local Thespians. One booth was occupied by ladies of the W. C. T. U., another by the Women’s Organization for National Prohibition Reform. Little country boys of the 4-H Club were housed with the rabbits and poultry in the nearby “Highlands,” a onetime funpark. Their eyes popped open a little wider at the exhibit of Milwaukee’s ever-hopeful Pabst Corp.: an oldtime saloon, complete with brass rail, sawdust, shiny glassware.

In the 4-H Club division, Milton Piper of Watertown, Wis., won the Holstein grand championship with his heifer, Ruby Homstead Ebenezer. Dolly WTild Rose Pietertje de Kil, owned by Martin Warren of Iowa City, won the junior yearling class ribbon. Princess Cascade Ormsby Bess, belonging to Vincent McLaury of Celwin, Iowa, was judged the best aged cow.

Champion milkmaid of the U. S. is now

Mary Fontanna of Caruthers, Calif., thrice winner of the Pacific coast championship. She drew 146.1 Ib. in ten 3-min periods. The race was nip-&-tuck; it was only by her decimal fraction that Mary Fontanna beat Gloria Miller of Pacific, Mo.

No event attracted more interest than the competition between the big Holsteins. Judged grand champion bull was a tremendous black-&-white beast named Man o’ War XXX. He weighed 2,500 Ib., was priced by his owner—Ed Hofland of Menomonie. Wis.—at $12,500. With imperious, melancholy eye, Man o’ War XXX watched a mere stripling weighing less than a ton and named Sir Triune Pansy null win the 12 mo.-18 mo. class.