PROCEEDINGS IOWA FAIR MANAGERS ASSN. 155 



had and to treat everyone as they asked to be treated. The Legislative 

 Committee which consisted of Mr. Bacon, Mr. Hoffman, Mr. Gatch and 

 myself had the very able assistance of Mr. Stanbery, who, we might say, is 

 an old war horse in politics, and he helped us a great deal in securing 

 the aid which we finally received. I also want to say, as Mr. Bacon did, 

 that we had the most hearty co-operation of Mr. C. E. Cameron, President 

 of the Iowa State Fair; Mr. Mullen, Vice President, and we had some 

 very good advice from Mr. Corey. I believe, gentlemen, that if we had 

 not conferred with these men who understand how to go after the legis- 

 lature that our efforts would not have been rewarded as well as they were. 



It was finally decided to give it to Mr. Santee who did such excellent 

 work for the fairs in previous years to secure state aid. Mr. Santee was 

 very willing to accept the bill and I want to say that he did some hard 

 earnest work on the bill. He was assisted by a number of men in the 

 House that I want to especially mention. One of these, and among the 

 first, is F. C. Sampson of Audubon. I also want to mention the good 

 work of H. B. Moorhead of Scott County, of J. W. Hanna of Benton County, 

 of J. H. McGhee of Cerro Gordo, of L. B. Forsling of Woodbury, F. C. 

 Lake of Woodbury, and Clyde H. Doolittle of Delaware County. We went 

 before a good many of the committees of the House. 



After having what we might say a difficult time in the various com- 

 mittees of the House the bill was finally brought out on the floor and it 

 was passed by the House after two months, providing, as Mr. Bacon said, 

 an appropriation of a maximum of $2,000 per fair. Then came the task 

 of putting it through the Senate. In choosing the man to handle the bill 

 in the Senate we again were at our wits end to know just who to use. 

 We finally decided that Ray P. Scott of Marshall county could handle the 

 bill for us. Mr. H. C. White, B. M. Stoddard of Woodbury, E. M. Smith 

 of Madison, Geo. S. Banta of Delaware, D. W. Kimberly of Scott, Henry 

 C. Adams of Algona, and Mr. Holdoegel of Webster also gave valuable 

 assistance in getting the bill through the Senate. We had the same task 

 in the Senate that we had in the House and the bill was finally passed 

 just a week or so before the adjournment of the legislature last spring. 



The bill has resulted in the ninety-two fairs of Iowa receiving an appro- 

 priation of $157,690,90, compared to an appropriation of $113,013.24 last 

 year, or an increase of $44,677.66. Now as to whether that is worth while 

 or not and as to whether the fairs needed that money or not I just want 

 to call your attention to the report of Mr. Corey in which he states that 

 twenty-one fairs had overdrafts this year of $50,351.33. A great many 

 fairs, the smaller ones, would have had an indebtedness on their hands 

 had they not had the increased state aid which was given them. I notice 

 from Mr. Corey's report also that the fairs are paying interest, and at 

 six per cent I figure out they are paying $64,610 a year or $20,000 more 

 than our increased amount of state aid. 



Some of you may ask, what else did the legislative committee do? Were 

 there any bills that were of possible interest to the fairs that were not 

 passed? The legislative committee considered it their duty and they con- 

 sidered they had enough to do if they did it right, to put through the 



