Missouri Home Makers' Conference. 575 



butter. I wish I had some means of testing for butter fat. 

 As you requested my age, I will say that I am fourteen. I 

 thank you for the interest you and the Home Makers' Con- 

 ference have shown in me and in my work." 



AGRICULTURE IN PETTIS COUNTY SCHOOLS. 



(T. R. Luckett, superintendent, Sedalia, Mo.) 



Agriculture has been taught as a regular part of the daily 

 program in the rural schools of Pettis county since 1908. It 

 has been attempted to make the work a little more concrete 

 and practical each year and to be governed a little less by the 

 textbook. 



This work, though usually considered essentially boys' work, 

 has been given to boys and girls alike, and the girls have shown 

 fully as much interest and enthusiasm in doing things such as 

 testing soils, selecting seeds according to science and common 

 sense, testing seeds for purity and for germination, as their 

 brothers. At the same time it has seemed that if boys were 

 given this work something should be done for the special bene- 

 fit of the girls, and in 1911-12 Miss Higginbotham of Ander- 

 son school. Miss Sullivan of Camp Branch and Miss Vaughan 

 of Maplewood gave their girls lessons in needlework. 



At the State Fair in 1912 Miss Higginbotham gave a 

 demonstration of this work with a class of five boys and five 

 girls. The girls worked on garments and used the different 

 stitches while the boys each sewed on buttons and made a 

 marble bag. The boys also were taught to put on a neat patch, 

 to mend a tear and to darn a worn place in heavy goods such as 

 men wear. 



Several more schools took up the work of their own accord 

 that winter, and by the close of the term in April, 1913, quite 

 a number of schools were doing good work along this line. 



In the summer of 1913 the Pettis County Home Makers 

 asked what could be done to help the girls, and it was suggested 

 that they get the mothers in the different districts organized 

 for the purposes of visiting the schools in a systematic manner 

 and of helping teachers and pupils by giving the work their 

 moral support. Last fall a letter was sent to every teacher 

 suggesting work of this kind and naming a set of sewing tablets 

 which could be used as a guide and text. About seventy-five 



