Rensselaer Republican, Volume 15, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 December 1882 — Goobers. [ARTICLE]

Goobers.

The little ant which burrows in the ground and takes care of itself may be called pindar, or peanut, or ground-pea, or goober, or anything else that the fancy of its friends may choose to invent, but its importance is not thereby affected. During the war, when a regiment of Georgia troops marching through Virginia broke into a cloverfield and tore it up by the roots in search of the esculent nut, they won for themselves the name of “goober-grab-blers,” and it is a name which still sticks to the people of the Empire State of the Sunny South. We are still called goober-grabblers by the outside world. But do we deserve the title ? It is to be feared not. Indeed, according to some statistics that have recently b§en published, Georgia is not quoted as a goob-er-raising or goober-grabbling State. Virginia produced last year not less than 2,000,000 bushels. Tennessee 500,000, and North Carolinia 125,000. Not a pound of goobers is made intq oil in this country, though during the war this business reached large proportions in the South. Cotton oil seed, however, has driven the peaiiut oil out of the market in this country, and has nearly succeeded in driving it out in Franco. The Africah nut, which is used in, France, is grown in Georgia. The North Oarolina goqber was onceoonsidered the best in the-market,, but.it has bfeen driven out by the Virginia variety,- ; The African goobefls small and meaty; tlje Spanish*sihall and thfe, and the Virginia ijjargeland tyell-nmrored. We have no doubt the Georgia^:variety would be the best of all, but this cannot be known until our farmers raise some for export. The drop is worth $3,000,000, and nearly or quite all of it passes through the hands of the venders on the street corners and the small shops. The crop is not prepared for market by the farmers. It is bought and prepared in factories, being divided into grades and brands. In Virginia forty bushels are raised to the acre, in Tennessee sixty and seventy. The demand is constantly increari"-. - manta Constitution. The stock-raisers of Colorado estimate the aggregate value of their flooks and herds at $85,059,005.