EIGHTEENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART II 103 



The Chairman : We have a department in our fair known as 

 the Boys' State Fair Camp, with which you are all familiar. We 

 select a boy from each county in the state by competition, and 

 those boys come to- the fair to the boys' camp. Of course we use 

 them wherever we can but half their time is spent in hearing 

 lectures and exercises in different departments of the fair. Then 

 when the boys g"o home we ask them to write an essay on the 

 Iowa State Fair. We have with us today the boy who wrote the 

 first prize essay. It gives me great pleasure to present to you 

 Herman W. Carlson of Blakesburg, the winner in the essay contest. 



WHAT I SAW AND LEARNED AT THE IOWA STATE FAIR. 



HERMAN W. CARLSON, BLAKESBURG. 



My trip to the Iowa State Fair and Exposition was truly very inter- 

 esting and educational to me. Traveling by way of the C, B. & Q. route 

 I saw part of Iowa's great farming land. Many were the fields of waving 

 corn upon which I gazed as I passed through them on my way to the 

 Boys' Camp at the Iowa State Fair and I was impressed as never before 

 that our state was truly a great agricultural state. However, I also passed 

 through numerous coal mining towns and this brought home to me the 

 fact that Iowa has other valuable industries as well as farming and 

 breeding live stock. 



Upon arriving in Des Moines I took a car direct to the fair grounds 

 and was soon at my destination. I was directed to the Administration 

 Building where I was enrolled as a member of the Boys' 1917 State Fair 

 Camp. Here in camp I made many new acquaintances and friends, and 

 spent"ten well-filled days of fun, recreation and work. Our work mostly 

 consisted of ushering at the grandstand and stock pavilion, and this 

 brought us in contact with all kinds of people and taught us that we all 

 need to practice self-control in a place of that sort. However, we were 

 always under the supervision of the camp leaders and they were always 

 ready and willing to help us. The Chapel services at the camp each 

 m.orning were a benefit to all of us I am sure. I for one will never 

 forget the talk on "Habit" given us by one of Uncle Sam's Army Chap- 

 lains. 



Surrounding the camp were many things of interest, among them the 

 machinery exhibits. This exhibit was a delight to the farm boy for here 

 he could see all the modern machinery, such as tractors, gasoline engines, 

 ensilage cutters, etc., which every farmer boy is interested in. 



I visited the Poultry Building, the Agricultural and Horticultural 

 Building and was greatly interested in the exhibits in both buildings. 

 The "Horn of Plenty" in the Agricultural Building was wonderful and 

 attracted the attention of thousands of people. The county exhibits and 

 the individual farm exhibits naturally interested all farmer boys and I 

 hope we gathered some valuable pointers for our home work from these 

 exhibits. , 



