No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 249 



them, but men are so busy at that time of the year that it is prac- 

 tically impossible. They come in seasons. One croj) of bugs will 

 come and they will lay their eggs and finally will disappear. They 

 hatch, grow to be adults, and they will be on hand for a week or 

 fen days and then they will disappear. ToAvards fall another crop 

 comes and they grow up and hibernate in the leaves and trash 

 around the edge of the field, and if the tops are heavy enough to get 

 under there, the}' will do it, but very few of them because the tops 

 do not fall down until windy, cold weather or snow comes and the 

 bugs are all in winter quartei'S before that time; but if the farmer 

 could do thorough spraying in the latter part of the season, we would 

 do away with a large part of the bugs. 



AGRICULTURE AND THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 



PROF. L. H. DENNIS, Expert Assistant in Agricultural Education, Depart- 

 ment of Public Instruction, Harrishurg , Pa. 



Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: On a recent trip through- 

 out the Middle Western states — I say recent, it was about a year 

 and a half or two years ago — it was my pleasure to go through the 

 Ford Automobile factory, located at Detroit. Visitors have access 

 to nearl}^ all parts of that great and wonderful factory. The most 

 interesting thing that one notices is the system that prevades every 

 shop. We were told, as we were taken through the various depart- 

 ments, that it is possible for the manager of that great factory to 

 find out at any time of the day, the exact status of every department 

 in the entire factory; the system is so complete. The thing that in- 

 terested me the most, however, was the fact that they have in their 

 various departments, specialists whose business it is to carry on a 

 searching examination and investigation every hour of the day and 

 every day of the week for the purpose of ascertaining if the best 

 processes are in use there at the present time. They carry on this 

 examination to see if it might be possible to substitute some other 

 materials in place of the materials they are now using, and to see 

 if it might not be possible to put the materials that are in use 

 through some difl'erent process in order to arrive at the same result 

 with less work, with increased et!iciency, and, of course, with greater 

 profit, which is the end. 



On that same trip, it was also my privilege to go tlirough, what is 

 probably the most modern flour mill in the United States; if not in 

 the world. It is not the largest flour mill in the United States, it 

 is one of the largest, but not the largest, but it is the most modern. 

 Again, the thing that interested me most there, outside of the direct 

 management of the mill, was the fact that these people have found 

 that it pays them in dollars and cents to hire a specialist whose busi- 

 ness it is every working day of the week to examine into the pro- 

 cesses used in that mill. He carries out physical and chemical tests 

 daily of the flour that is turned out there, what they call blended 

 flour. It doesn't have quite the same meaning as when we use that 

 term. The man who holds that position was for years an agricul- 



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