Missouri Country Life Conference. 229 



people were there with exhibits. One old gentleman with some 

 potatoes, a man whom nobody had ever encouraged about his 

 farming, but his potatoes took the blue ribbon that year, and he 

 was just as much pleased as a little child. One had some oats, 

 of course, and he took a blue ribbon. The fair was made an 

 annual event, and by working together we became better ac- 

 quainted. I think, too, it developed in the minds of the older 

 people an ambition for their children that they might learn to 

 do better, to be more than they themselves had been, to have 

 more opportunities. 



In February, 1913, Mr. R. H. Boston, our superintendent 

 of county schools, called a meeting of the teachers and patrons 

 and the school board at Elm, and at this meeting they discussed, 

 among other things, the advisability of a rural high school at 

 Elm. The citizens were sure it would be impossible to vote this 

 and organize the high school, as the state law required. A few 

 of the leading citizens were not willing that their children, who 

 were just then ready for high school, should wait these two or 

 three years for consolidation, so they formed a stock company, 

 selling shares at twenty-five dollars each. Some took just one 

 share, some took three and some as high as eight. Then one 

 gentleman in the neighborhood who had no children to send to 

 school — he was an old man, his children were all grown and able 

 to support themselves — gave two acres of land to put the build- 

 ing upon, with the promise that when they needed it he would 

 give two more, and I think he will give more. It is not the old 

 men of our neighborhood who are the kickers. It is the man 

 who says: "I went to school so and so, and that is good enough 

 for me and will do for anybody." Perhaps you have all seen 

 him. Well, this school proposition has exceeded our wildest 

 dreams as a success. The men laid their plans for a large build- 

 ing, well equipped. You know they knew what they needed, but 

 when they came to look at the funds there was a limit, and it was 

 just a little bit discouraging. The men would come home from 

 these meetings of the stockholders looking so blue and say: "I 

 don't know whether we are going to make it go or not." Then 

 you know the drouth struck us, and it being a strictly agricul- 

 tural district, I think we suffered more, perhaps, than we would 

 otherwise have done. Just here we mothers thought it time for 

 us to go to work. On the Monday after Mothers' Day in May 

 we met and organized the Rural Improvement League of Jack- 

 son Township. We got the idea from some of our city sisters 



