FARMERS' INSTITUTES IN 1906. 



No State in the Union of equal area has a more diversified 

 agriculture than Connecticut and none is more favorably 

 situated to make that agriculture profitable. 



With only one-eighth of our population engaged in 

 rural pursuits, the remaining seven-eighths afford large and 

 profitable local markets for the varied products of the soil, 

 and in addition we have almost on our borders the popu- 

 lous cities of New York and Boston always ready to receive 

 any surplus that may be produced. 



Yet these local advantages and diversity of interests in- 

 stead of simplifying have in reality complicated the problems 

 of successful institute work. The gardener and tobacco 

 grower can rarely be brought to an institute devoted to the 

 interests of the dairyman or fruit grower and these latter 

 equally disregard any subject outside the specialties in which 

 they are engaged. In states where forty to sixty per cent, of 

 the population are engaged in growing wheat or corn it is 

 not difficult to secure large and enthusiastic audiences inter- 

 ested in those subjects, and in several states Railroads have 

 furnished free trains to transport speakers and exhibits for 

 disseminating the latest results of scientific investigation, 

 but the trials of this method in New England have thus far 

 failed of the success that was hoped for. 



Another fact which should not be overlooked, and one of 

 which we may be justly proud is this, that the native popu- 

 lation of Connecticut stands at the head of the states of the 

 Union, — (but one other state ranking with it) in literacy. 



We are a reading people, and the press has very largely 

 supplanted the platform. 



The U. S. Department of Agriculture and our State Ex- 

 periment Stations are issuing bulletins freely to all who care 



