194 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



Up to about a generation ago there was but little organized effort 

 looking toward the ditTiision of dairy intelligence among the people, 

 and "little readiness on their part to receive it. Within the past 

 thirty years, however, agricultural education — using the term in the 

 broad and not in a restricted senee — in common with the advance in 

 all educational affairs, has made great strides. The dairyman now 

 reads the agricultural press, joins farmers' organizations of sundry 

 kinds, attends farmers' institutes, note® and makes use, so far as may 

 be, of the various activities of the agricultural school and college. 

 His horizon is no longer limited, but, thanks to these several agen- 

 cies, he can know what is going on in the dairy world, can post him- 

 self on newer ideas, and increase his chances of success. 



This educational effort, however, has not been as effective as it 

 might have been or as it is yet destined to be. There has been much 

 scattering of effort, lack of co-ordination, much experimenting with 

 methods of presentation of ideas, and manj^ mistakes made in the 

 editorial sanctum, on the institute i)latform, in the college lecture 

 room and in the experiment station laboratory. Then, too, all dairy- 

 men have not been of the type just cited. The teachers of the press, 

 the agricultural associations and the colleges have often to encoun- 

 ter the indifference, incredulity and hostility of those whose best 

 interests they serve. I don't want to hear any of your theories; I 

 don't believe a word of them; I have no use for book farming; those 

 fellows don't practice what they preach; 'taint practical. How com- 

 mon in bj'gone days were such remarks! The tribe is not yet extinct; 

 but its numbers are fewer, and there is great hope of the next genera- 

 tion. 



The children which are coming up to take our places ought to 

 have a better chance than ourselves. Their minds are in a receptive 

 state. Possibly that very disrespect, of which we are apt to com- 

 plain, will make it easier for them to grasp and to believe a dairy 

 truth which their fathers have not credited. They will get the ben- 

 efit of the greater effectiveness and the better co-ordination of the 

 sundry lines of effort in agricultural teaching resulting from past ex- 

 perience. I look for the introduction of agricultural teaching in 

 some form, direct or indirect, in our public schools in the near future. 

 I noticed in a dairy paper some time ago, an excellent scheme for in- 

 stilling a fundamental truth about dairying into the children's minds 

 by insinuation. The proposition was to take examples from agricul- 

 tural rather than from commercial practice. My little daughter 

 brought me her arithmetic paper the other day. One of the ques- 

 tions read: "A man bought cloth for 31 cents, sugar for 24 cents and 

 salt for 11 cents. How much did he pay for all?" Now, why might 

 not the question read: ''The cow Bettie gave 31 pounds of milk, Topsy 

 24 pounds and Spot only 11 pounds. How much did they all give?'' 



