Goofer Feathers

Mack: We had a farm in Rome.

Moran: What did you raise on your farm?

Mack: It was a small farm. It wasn't much. . . . Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned it. We only raised goofer feathers. That's about all.

Moran: Goofer feathers?

Mack: Yes. . . . Didn't you ever sleep on goofer feathers? Oh, they are so-o-o soft.

Moran: What are they made of?

Mack: Why, just fuzz from peaches.*

Not much has been heard of goofer feathers since the blackface team of Moran & Mack made them colloquially famous in the '20s. But as soon as a serious-minded manufacturer, Food Machinery Corp. of San Jose, Calif., can convert from war to peacetime products, the steady production of goofer feathers will become a main feature of a new U.S. industry. Food Machinery Corp. has designed and plans to market a peach de-fuzzing machine. The fuzz from the peaches, wafted by compressed air through a vent in the top of the machine, will become goofer feathers (to be thrown away). But the de-fuzzed peaches are expected to sell at a premium of $1 a box. (Cost of de-fuzzing--1-c- a box.)

Food Machinery Corp. will also build in its ten plants, scattered from California to Florida: 1) a dehydrating haymaker--that cuts hay and rolls it so that all moisture is squeezed out; 2) a new fast-moving sprayer for orchards; 3) a potato-harvesting machine that will dig, brush, grade and box potatoes in the field.

* From Columbia record Two Black Crows.

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