Fruit for Minnesota by Dudley Marvin Canright

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Apr 1, 1873

Fruit for Minnesota.

By Dudley Marvin Canright

In the line of food, our people in Minnesota feel the need of fruit more than any other thing. As we drop the use of tobacco, tea, coffee, but especially meat, we feel this want more than other people. Wheat is abundant, good, and cheap, and fair graham flour can be had at almost any mill, if wished. Cows are cheap and pastures plenty. Corn, potatoes, beans, peas, and all kinds of garden vegetables of the very best quality can be raised in abundance, with little labor. These are the very things which we health reformers need the most. The trouble is, the farmers spend all their labor in raising wheat, corn, and stock, while fruit and garden vegetables are almost entirely neglected, and not being able to buy much beyond what they raise themselves, the table does not generally present a very great variety. Take from these tea, coffee, and meat, and there is not much but bread and potatoes left. Hence many think they cannot live the health reform.

Now as spring is coming on, I want to suggest a change in some things. Instead of spending all your time and strength in raising wheat and corn, take a part of that time and raise a good garden. It will not be labor lost, I assure you. Provide a good supply for your family the year round. It will be money in your pockets and health in your bones. The more vegetables you have, the less flour you will use. Do not put out a garden and leave it for your wife to tend, or for it to grow up to weeds, as most do. Take hold of it in earnest; give it a fair trial, and you will never be sorry.

But can fruit be raised in Minnesota? Yes; I know it can from what I have seen. Strawberries, raspberries, currants, gooseberries, and other small fruits do well, so far as I have seen, as well as in other States. There is no reason why every family, with a little labor, and a small expense on the start, cannot have all they can use the year round of these fruits. Put out this spring, next year they will produce a crop. If you are not able to buy many, then buy a few plants on the start, and you will soon raise all you want. Indeed, if you cannot buy any, then go to the woods and get wild ones. You will be surprised to see how well they will do. Some who have tried the wild raspberry say it is about as good as the tame. Send for the little ten cent tract at the Office, “How to Cultivate Small Fruit.” Also see W. C. White’s advertisement of small fruit. Come, brethren, take hold of this matter now. Do not lose another year. I will give you any information you want.

Last summer I saw trees which had been planted four or five years, loaded down with fruit. True, the apples were not large, but they were good—they were apples. At the county fair at Hutchinson, held last fall, I was surprised to see such a large, fine variety of apples, grapes, plums, pears, &c. I know they can be raised in a short time if the proper varieties are obtained.

In no State where I have been are these things needed more by our people than in Minnesota. The country is new, and people have thought they could not raise them; hence, proper efforts have not been made. I hope to see a good advance made in the health reform in Minnesota this year; but it cannot be done without attending to these things. Hence, I urge them upon your attention.

D. M. CANRIGHT.

Parma, Mich.