Fruit-growing has a long history in Cape County

In August 1922, the decennial of the Missouri Farm Bureau was celebrated in Cape Girardeau with a large parade and picnic at Fairground Park. Nationally-known agriculture experts came here to address the big crowd.

According to an article in the Southeast Missourian at the time, the National Farm Bureau didn't permit the commercialization of any of its meetings. That meant that the celebration's organizers couldn't sell special programs or souvenir books loaded with advertisements. Because of these limitations, organizers asked the publishers of the Southeast Missourian to produce a special section devoted to the Missouri Farm Bureau and its important work among the state's farmers.

This they did. The section was published Aug. 10, 1922, and featured numerous photographs and articles describing the region's agricultural conditions. Copies were distributed to every farm bureau member in Southeast Missouri.

Among the articles was one describing fruit-growing operations in Cape Girardeau County:

The Henderson orchard, near Jackson. (Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce photo ~ Southeast Missourian archive)

CAPE COUNTY SOON TO BE BANNER ORCHARD DISTRICT

If anyone is under the impression that dairying, or stock raising, or farming is the one great and growing industry of Cape Girardeau County, he might as well get acquainted with all the facts.

Fruit growing is rapidly becoming one of the most important industries and if nothing happens it will be but a few years until Cape County will have to be reckoned with when orchard figures are compiled in Missouri.

Lee Bowman and a few others have the Elladora Orchard of nearly 200 acres going right along. Of the 200 acres over 100 acres are already in trees. There are 2,750 peach trees nearly 2 years old and 4,250 apple trees that were set out last fall. John J. Holtz is in charge of the orchard. More trees will be set out the coming fall and nearly the entire farm will be set in trees.

Ochs has two

Theodore Ochs has two orchards going, one at his beautiful home place on North Sprigg Street Road and the other in the south part of the county. At his home place he has about 200 peach trees and 200 apple trees and all are loaded to the ground with fruit this year. His peach trees have produced a great crop, although this was their first year and they are all very young. The apple trees have the finest specimens of fruit ever seen in this country. He also has many trees bearing other kinds of fruit.

At his larger fruit farm, known as the Pioneer Farm, 110 acres of the 120 are in trees. There are 6,000 apple and 2,600 peach, most all having been set out last year.

The Bowmans also have a 15-acre orchard on the old (St. Vincent's) College Farm (near Cape Rock), it being one of the oldest orchards in the county. For many years this orchard has produced an exceptionally fine quality of Winesap apples and the prospect for a great crop was never so good as at present.

A wonderful sight

One of the finest sights ever seen in Cape Girardeau has been enjoyed by many people who visited the J.M. Seitz fruit farm on North Sprigg Street Road the past 10 days. The orchard is yielding its first crop this year and there seems to be no end to the peaches.

Monday 120 bushels of peaches were picked and people hauled them away as fast as they could get them. The price ranged from $1 to $2 a bushel. It is estimated that the orchard will yield from 500 to 700 bushels.

Mr. Seitz has about as many apple trees as peach and the prospects for an apple crop could not be better. This is one of the finest orchards in Cape County and is destined to develop within the next few years into one of the model orchards of the state.

The W.H. Brucher fruit farm north of the State College is bearing a record crop of peaches at present and will produce equally as great a crop of apples. The Bruchers expect to have about 300 bushels of peaches. This has been a very fine orchard for several years.

Can't supply demand

The Henderson orchard west of Jackson, long known as one of the largest and best orchards in Cape County, is a veritable picture this year. The hundreds of trees are loaded to capacity with the finest peaches ever seen, but the demand for them cannot be met.

There are several other moderate sized orchards in Cape County and within three years there will be thousands of bearing fruit trees in the county that were not here two years ago.

That the supply will not exceed the demand has been proved this year. Cape orchards have produced hundreds of bushels of peaches in the past two weeks but the local people stormed the orchards with their baskets and carried them away as fast a they were picked. Had these orchards produced 10 times as much fruit, every bit could have been sold.