334 REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS. 



at which time tlio school was dismissed for ihc ])Uipose, and the boys 

 and from '>\0 to aO fanners assembled in one room, and the ^irJs and 

 Avomen in another room for instruction in home economics. The 

 lectures and discussions lasted two hours. Each farmer paid a small 

 fee to defray traveling expenses of lecturers. These two courses 

 proved to be very successful. 



West Virginia: An approach to tlie county itinerant instructor 

 found in several foreign countries, and which for manv vears has 

 proven of such value to the agricultural interests, among the small 

 holders especially, has been inaugurated in West Virginia, where 

 a special field man was last season emplo3'ed by the year whose duty 

 it was to go over the State among the farmers and hold special 

 institute meetings wherever and whenever he could get a few of them 

 together. This method of reaching certain farmers shoidd prove of 

 value in the more thickly settled regions, especially wdiere small farms 

 are the rule. 



AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE EXTENSION WORK. 



The establishment of colleges of agriculture and more especially the 

 creation later of experiment stations in connection with them stim- 

 ulated the demand for the acquisition of new, accurate, and specific 

 information regarding all classes of agricultural subjects and opera- 

 tions based on a scientific study of the principles underlying the 

 various sciences bearing on agriculture. This search after new 

 truth was not only productive of much good to agriculture in all 

 its phases, but also many new sciences such as mycolog}", entomology, 

 vegetable pathology and the like were largely developed out of the 

 divisions of older ones through their immediate application to agri- 

 culture. Every science and art having directly or indirectly an 

 economic bearing on agriculture received an impulse and a stimulus, 

 accurate scientific experiments were carried on in many lines, great 

 and rapid strides were made in all directions, exceeding the most san- 

 guine expectations. The great demand was for " research " — the 

 acquisition of more truth and information regarding all agricultural 

 subjects. 



But the time has now arrived when it is apparent that the vast store 

 of agricultural information thus accumulated and rapidly being 

 added to is not fully reaching the people for whom it is intended — 

 the actual farmers. The colleges of agriculture, through the students 

 "who enter their doors, are imparting this information to but a very 

 small percentage of the agricultural people. The vast army of actual 

 farmers for whom this information is intended can not attend college 

 at all — not even for a few weeks short course in the winter. 



The publishing and distributing of circulars, bulletins, reports, 

 and the like, dealing with agricultural subjects and giving the latest 



