194 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



a state, gentlemen, that stands upon the very edge of the future that can 

 say to any other state in the Union. "You are not ahead of us in all that 

 goes from human welfare and human good." That is the kind of a state 

 we ought to have, and that is the kind of a state that we are proud of. 

 During the ten or twelve years in which we have made these educa- 

 tional institutions, w'e have also made that other great institution, the 

 State Fair, which is educational, where the people of the state of 

 Iowa may gather year after year for a week and study the advantages 

 that may be brought to the state through the institution that we call the 

 State Fair. There you see the inventive genius of man in all sorts of 

 machinery, and especially in agricultural machinery which is such a 

 potent factor on the farms of the state. There is seen what Iowa has 

 produced. There is seen the finest of the fine animals of the state. 

 There is an incentive and stimulus to the people to go forward; there is 

 an inspiration. And I tell you that a man without an inspiration, the 

 man without a vision of what this state ought to be, or what its people 

 ought to be, I would almost say, is hardly worthy of being a citizen of 

 such a state as Iowa. Every man ought to have a vision not only of 

 what this state is now, but what it is to be in the years that are to 

 come, when the population of millions that I spoke of last night will be 

 here. We as citizens of the state ought to be laying the foundations now 

 for the necessities of the years that are to come, that will be pressed upon 

 us and demanded of our soil and of our people. We ought to be getting 

 ready, and the Fair is a help in getting ready for these coming years. 



That plant over there, this report says, is valued at $1,122,923, nearly 

 a million and a quarter of dollars. I think that probably the total in- 

 vestment of the state made in lands, as I get it from another report, is 

 $70,000 in the bare land that was originally purchased. I want to call 

 your attention to these things for the purpose of showing that your legis- 

 lature and your public men have not been making mistakes in invest- 

 ments, for the investments that they have made have doubled over and 

 over again. When I was at Iowa City as a student, lands and lots down 

 there could, have been bought for a song as compared with what they are 

 worth now. A few years ago the legislature of this state declined to 

 purchase some land there this side of the Iowa River for enlarging the 

 university grounds when it could have bought it at a very reasonable 

 price; but today, as I ascertained when I was there a week or so ago, 

 it would cost three times as much money. It would have been a fine 

 investment for the state of Iowa to have purchased it at that time. 

 Your legislature has never made an investment or purchase that has not 

 doubled over and over again in value. So I say, the legislatures of this 

 state have been wise. Criticism falls upon legislators, very frequently. 

 Actually, before the organization of a general assembly sometimes, crit- 

 icism begins to fall upon members for what they might possibly do, 

 or for mistakes that they may possibly make. Our people elect a man 

 to the legislature because of his honesty, his integrity, his ability, his 

 worth as a citizen. That worth, and that ability and that integrity do 

 not change in him on the way down here from his home, but he goes into 

 the legislature the same trusted man, the same man of integrity, lov- 

 ing the state and wanting to do what is for the public welfare. And after 



