Another example was the Southern Texas Truck Growers’ Association which was organized in 1905. At that time the farmers were producing about five hundred car loads of onions a year and not making a living from them. The following year they shipped nine hundred cars; the next year one thousand cars; the next year two thousand cars, and in 1910 twenty-five hundred cars valued at one million five hundred thousand dollars. We had twenty more such examples for encouragement but we didn’t need any of them. Our own needs suggested our own remedy and that spring the Pioneer Products Company took out its charter. CHAPTER XIV FINDING OURSELVES The Pioneer Products Company was capitalized for three thousand dollars. Shares were sold for a dollar each, but each member was required to purchase five shares and not allowed to purchase more than twenty. Our object as set forth in the constitution was “the buying, selling, and handling of produce; the selling and consigning of produce as agent of the producer; the inspection of all produce so consigned; and the owning and operating of whatsoever shall be deemed to the advantage of the producer.” The active management was to be in the hands of the general manager, who was to receive a small salary, and the secretary-treasurer. One of the most important provisions reads as follows: “All stockholders in the company shall be compelled to ship through the company.” This was inserted as a protection against the bribing of members by city commission men whose object might be to break up the organization by offering, for a time, higher prices. Our plan for distribution of profits provided that after all expenses were paid a dividend not exceeding ten per cent. might be voted; that after this a sum amounting to a tax of not over one dollar a share should be reserved from the surplus as a reserve fund, and the remainder distributed among members in proportion to the amount of business done. A board of five directors elected by members was to have general supervision of the business with power to adjust all grievances.