Jasper County Democrat, Volume 20, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 May 1917 — POTATOES SHOULD BE CHEAPER [ARTICLE]

POTATOES SHOULD BE CHEAPER

New potatoes, as yet undug, but lor delivery May 15, were offered for sale yesterday in Chicago for $5 a barrel. They will come from Georgia and South Carolina, where the acreage is 33 per cent above normal. Digging will start May 10 and a week after that they will be plentiful. Soon afterward, potatoes will be ready in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. To the present time practically the entire new potato shipments have come from Florida. Yesterday they retailed at two pounds for 15 cents. Old potatoes were 75 cents a peck. With contracts offered at $5 a barrel, which is $1.66 a bushel, for new potatoes in two weeks, it is expected that prices will slump sharply soon.—Friday’s Hammond Times.