Choice gleanings from 45-years plus of Unregistered Bull.

Mr. Ezra T. Benson
Washington, D.C.
Dear Mr. Benson,

Seeing as how everybody else in the country has been swamping you with advice on the best way to help us pore cattlemen pull ourselves up by our own boot straps, I thought it was time I did my part of all this heavy thinking. My only regret is that I have only one brain cell to offer my country-boy colleagues, but I believe that one puts me in the 90-percent-of-parity class.

Up to date, all I've seen in the way of cures for the cowman has been limited to the producers. The purpose of this letter is to call your attention to a segment of the industry which is extremely important but which, unless something is done muy pronto, seems in great danger of complete extinction.

I refer, sir, to that noble individualist, commonly known as the Speculator.

Now I trust you'll keep this letter confidential. Anybody who comes out too strongly in defense of the Speculator is extending his neck to an alarming extent. All my life I've been suspicious of Speculators because I come from a long line of producers and that's the way they felt. That's the way my neighbors feel. If some old boy bought a string of cattle and went broke, everyday bawled and bawled until somebody came up with the statement like, "Oh well, he was just a Speculator, anyway." Then everybody felt better.

Up to this year, I figured a Speculator was a man that had a license to steal. When one of them bought some cattle from me and made money on them, it always made me mad. The same way with all the other cowmen I know.

However, times have changed and I, for one, have begun to think they haven't changed for the better. Naturally you'll be interested in this because there's another election coming up eventually, and maybe the way I feel is a straw in the wind. If things keep going on like this, the cow country is liable to get pretty breezy before long.

To get back to the point of this letter — how about doing something for the Speculator? You've given some of us ranchers drouth relief but it didn't do much permanent good for the market. The corn growers already had a subsidy when you came in office, but that hasn't helped us cowmen any that I can see. You've been buying some beef along, but I notice some of the boys up in Oklahoma claim you're as hard to trade with as a packer.

All this wouldn't have been necessary if there were any Speculators around. I can remember when you could sell cattle to a Speculator whether anybody else wanted 'em or not. But for some strange reason there don't seem to be any Speculators around anymore. It's been months since anybody's seen one in this neck of the woods. I thought I'd found one the other day. At least he looked just like one I used to know. He's busting tires in a service station down the street. As soon as I get time I'm going to investigate; if he turns out to be a genuine Speculator, maybe I can get my calf crop sold after all.

Maybe they've migrated to Mexico or somewhere and will come back in the spring, like the swallows to Capistrano. But I doubt it unless you take steps to make the local climate more favorable. Personally, I think the species has been practically wiped out by a disease which bothers all of us once in a while but which is plumb fatal to Speculators. It's called Disappearance of the Dinero.

Probably there are still enough of them around to perpetuate the species if they were given a quick vaccination against this ailment — say a preliminary shot of around $50,000 apiece, followed by similar doses every three weeks. This would enable you to help us producers without us having to admit you were doing so.

Like I say, please don't let anybody here know I tried to do anything about the Speculator right now. I'm ahead of the rest of the boys in this country. I'm also a little more broadminded than some of them. But it's just a matter of time ‘til the whole bunch will notice the absence of Speculators and start howling for you to import some, like putting earthworms in a flower bed to make things grow. I'm just tipping you off so you'll be ready to take your characteristic fast action when the time comes.

Yours for more Free Enterprise & Speculation, signed John. — (S.F. 09/17/53)