236 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



the price; go down in our jeans and get the money to build the 

 schoolhouse, equip it and employ the teachers. 



There comes a time in the life of every country boy and 

 country girl when they realize that they are too old and too 

 big to go to school. That is the most critical time in all their 

 lives. That is usually the last day of the country school. On 

 that day when they have completed the eighth-grade work they 

 pass the eighth milestone, the place where the road forks. One 

 road leads to the city and one leads back to the farm. Which 

 road will your boy and your girl take? If it is the road that leads 

 to the city, to the high school, all good and well. If it is the 

 road that leads back to the farm, will they stay on the farm or 

 will they become dissatisfied and leave? Today we hear the 

 cry in all parts of the State, "The country boy is leaving the 

 farm." 



Not long ago a man said to me: "What are we going to do 

 to keep the farm boy on the farm?" 



I said: "There are perhaps a great many things we will 

 have to do if we keep the farm boy on the farm, but there is one 

 thing I am sure we will have to do if we keep the farm boy on 

 the farm — we must keep the farm girl there. I believe if we 

 keep the farm girl on the farm the farm boy will stay." 



But the farm girl is not staying on the farm, neither is the 

 farm boy. 



There are many reasons why the farm boy is leaving the 

 farm, some of which I shall mention. I believe that every coun- 

 try boy has an inherent right to share in the profits of some 

 phase of activity on the farm. I believe that every girl has an 

 inherent right to wear pretty clothes and look pretty, yet there 

 are thousands of homes in this State where the boys reach the age 

 of twenty-one without having a share of the profits of the farm, 

 where girls grow up and money is no item, and they do not have 

 pretty clothes. 



Is it any wonder that when somebody comes around and 

 says, "I would not stay at home and work for dad for board 

 and clothes — not very good at the best — I would go to town 

 and get a job," that they want to go? But I do claim that the 

 man or woman who goes nosing around in the world making 

 other people dissatisfied with present conditions without offer- 

 ing something better has no right to a place in society. If you 

 do not believe that country boys and country girls hear these 

 things, just ask them and see what they will tell you. 



