The Medford High School released classes for a week on Monday, Oct. 6, 1919, to allow students to pick apples in the orchards surrounding the Southern Oregon city.
The Medford Commercial Club organized the student recruitment on behalf of the valley’s orchardists, who were determined to harvest the crop despite a box shortage. The apple growers estimated they needed 300 pickers. The Commercial Club had signed up 274 students by Monday.
A committee in charge of the picking campaign attended a high school assembly and read a list of orchards and the number of pickers needed for each one. Some students returned to orchards where they had previously worked that year or chose specific orchards that interested them. Others reported to the Commercial Club for assignment the next day.
The Medford Mail Tribune reported on Oct. 6, “The success of the campaign to save the million dollar apple crop now depends on the fidelity with which the high school students apply themselves to the big task,”
The previous April, the newspaper said optimistic fruit growers were predicting apple and pear orchards would produce 2,000 carloads of fruit.
Sources: "Medford Optimistic." Better Fruit, Apr. 1919, p. 7+. Southern Oregon Revised: Rogue Valley Orchard History, truwe.sohs.org/files/orchards.html. Accessed 24 Oct. 2019; "Mail Tribune 100.” [originally published as "High School is Adjourned for Orchard Picking." 6 Oct. 1919]." Mail Tribune, 16 Oct. 2019 [Medford, Ore.], local ed., p. B1.
